Cultural sustainability in fashion. A long-term goal.
Keeping it very simple, cultural sustainability means successful transmission of traditional knowledge to future generations.
Unless you are an ethnographer, anthropologist, member of an indigenous community, employee of the World Intellectual Property Organization, passionate advocate for the protection of intangible heritage or cultural intellectual property lawyer like me, you are probably not familiar with this terminology and it is totally understandable. So I made this scheme below in an attempt to ease your introduction to this conversation on cultural sustainability.
You will very quickly observe that the simplified scheme shows the relational path between traditional knowledge and traditional garments and jewellery. If we were to continue this relational scheme we would see how traditional garments and jewellery as well as traditional crafts and oral traditions represent a source of inspiration in contemporary fashion and product design.
But what is the relationship between the fashion industry and cultural sustainability?
Cultural sustainability in fashion is a relatively new concept. In the past decade the relationship has been more appropriative (see cultural appropriation in fashion) than appreciative but the discourse is changing and with it behaviors have to change as well.
For 2019/2020 global trend-forecaster Li Edelkoort envisions Folklore as major inspiration theme in fashion and interior design and WGSN, the industry’s most influential trend-forecasting platforms encourages partnerships with local craft communities and honoring of people and tradition.
While this is encouraging, the question is: do fashion actors perceive this as a trend or as a long-term goal?
Building relationships with craft communities exceeds trend-forecasting. CULTURAL SUSTAINABILITY means transmitting/supporting the knowledge transfer of traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions to future generations and fashion is an extraordinary medium for achieving this noble goal.
The Cultural Intellectual Property Right Initiative believes fashion can be a pioneering industry for cultural sustainability and proposes the triple C mechanism (Consent, due Credit and fair Compensation) as the governing rule for relationships between the fashion business and traditional creative communities.
Complement this reading with the Report of the 1st Cultural Sustainability in Fashion Workshop accessible online here: https://www.culturalintellectualproperty.com/library and my TEDx Talk: “Cultural Fashion: Transform the Fashion Industry from Villain to Hero”
