Monthly Archives: June 2009

Free Speech: Hadley Freeman Ponders The Fashionable Fallout Of A Faltering Economy

http://www.style.com/stylefile/2008/10/free-speech-hadley-freeman-ponders-the-fashionable-fallout-of-a-faltering-economy/

Contradicting to my other post about financialization of fashion, in this article it almost seems as if it doesn’t care if the economy has any impact on it at all. They feel like fashion still continues, still has the need to provide to people on how they should look. 

“because they know that the real money is with people who won’t be affected by this financial downturn at all. Fashion houses will be aiming for the new markets—Russia, China, India, the Middle East, and South America—and the enormous wealth therein.”

What the hell is this? That REAL money is with the people who won’t be affect by this crisis. In other words, they only want to target the rich because ultimately they are the only ones who will be spending in this crisis. This makes me angry in a sense that they are only targeting a specific class and this is why everything is financialize about fashion. I mean you make things people can’t afford and want, making all these commodities and you have young people who are determine to get it because they feel that it defines them. Then you have credit cards available to people who can’t pay for it but have access and just buy without thinking. This whole mess just going around and around in circles. Fashion has no mercy, they can care less about the crisis except the sales they need to make and how they are going to finanicialize their ideas only to a selective few.

Fashion industry hit by hard financial times

http://www.3news.co.nz/News/NationalNews/Fashion-industry-hit-by-hard-financial-times/tabid/423/articleID/104380/cat/64/Default.aspx

In this articles it basically just talks about how the crisis harmed the fashion industry.  I find it ineresting that they are talking on new ideas on how to make their sales. I did my research paper on fashion and financialization of fashion.  WIth this point proven, there are alternative ways they were looking to financialize it. 

“”The middle, mainstream customer who shopped with us every week or every month are not buying as much or they’re going elsewhere,” she says. “They’re doing other things with their disposable income.”

As you can see most middle class are started to be pushed down, yea of course the rich will still be rich and buy the expensive clothes. But what happens to the middle and low class people, they will find their way as well. What stucks me the most in this article is one of the lady see a gap in the fashion industry and decided to open up and sewing and mending store. What is the next step for fashion, would people start to realize that they don’t need as much clothes as they use it and that these vintage or thift shop might actually get more recongnize. The idea of opening up a sewing and mending service brings me to think about what people might start doing now that times are high. Will we start to recycle more and less waste, maybe the time consumption of an item will be recongize for it’s value, as in maybe we will learn not to waste food or use styrafoam, but now we need to start conserving. It’s a possiblity that what we talked about in the beginning of the clasa about waste, might take in effect where shoes should be worn for 1 year rather than 3 months. Maybe, we shall see..