Fashion

This introduction to fashion is aimed at students of fashion design across the world. By following the design process, from historical and commercial industry context to final collection presentation, the book provides a clear guide for students as they discover what designing for fashion entails.

The book investigates the ways in which AI is impacting every part of the fashion value chain starting with product discovery and working backwards to manufacturing.

In 2016, social media users in Thailand called out the Paris-based luxury fashion house Balenciaga for copying the popular Thai “rainbow bag,” using Balenciaga's hashtags to circulate memes revealing the source of the bags'design. In Why We Can't Have Nice Things Minh-Ha T. Pham examines the way social media users monitor the fashion market for the appearance of knockoff fashion, design theft, and plagiarism.

Fashion is under the spotlight like never before. Activists call for environmental accountability, and wide-ranging debates highlight exploitation across global supply chains and the reliance on unpaid labour. Digital technology undermines traditional fashion companies, while small-scale independent fashion designers provide radical innovations in design and work in more socially inclusive ways. This book contributes to a new sociology of fashion.