London Fashion Week is such a flurry of beautiful clothes and beautiful people, that it’s rare to stop and think about what it all really means. So it was bang-on timing for the London College of Fashion’s Centre for Sustainable Fashion to choose LFW’s final day to get together a group of young people who will soon be voting for the first time to talk about politics through a fashion lens for a day of activity labelled 'I Stood Up' at the House of Lords.
Aside from Vivienne Westwood’s plug for the Green Party, LFW was a distinctly non-political affair, especially as Meadham Kirchhoff - who last season showed period-stained pants as an act of defiance against the patriarchy - were absent due to financial difficulties. LCF’s Professor Dilys Williams, once Head of Design at Katharine Hamnett, is passionate that we should begin to use fashion as a form of political expression again. 'Fashion has been distracted by consumerism lately,' she told me, 'but the power of what we wear on our bodies can really engage people.'
And so to the first workshop, where Cape Farewell, a project which seeks to give a cultural response the climate change, worked with the group to create slogan tees similar to those by Katharine Hamnett which were a powerful statement of political protest during the 80s and 90s. Such as the momentous occasion when Hamnett wore a dress emblazoned with '58% don’t want Pershing' (Pershing was a nuclear missile) to meet Margaret Thatcher at Downing Street in 1984, the same year she won Designer of the Year - could you possibly imagine that happening now?
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In the evening, the first-time voters gathered to put questions to a panel which included Louise Court, editor of Cosmopolitan, Frances Corner, Pro-Vice Chancellor of LCF, Lois McNay, Professor of Politics from Oxford University, Amelia Womack, Deputy Leader of the Green party, Lord Tyler, a Lib Dem peer and Alison McGovern, Labour MP all chaired by the rather wonderful Baroness Lola Young, who sits on the All Party Parliamentary Group on Ethics and Sustainability in Fashion.
Proceedings kicked off with a poetry reading by Sabrina Mahfouz, who brilliantly elucidates issues affecting young people with her work. She read ‘Down Another Hole’ which explores the body image struggles which women from all backgrounds suffer with; ‘I don’t want to look hourglass, I want to look ill’ is just one of her incisively on-point lines. You can watch the whole thing here.
During the wide-ranging debate which ensued, the panel and audience touched on a huge number of issues, here’s your four-point lowdown on their thoughts.
1. The portrayal of women in the media
'The media only portray young women drunk in gutters at New Year, there’s no coverage of their inventiveness, kindness and curiosity' said Cosmo Editor, Louise Court as she discussed why young people might be turned off from politics. When you don’t see the reality of your life represented, you’re bound to switch off.
2. How do you balance self-expression with sustainability?
'Fashion can be both oppressive and liberating, we need to be emphatic about combating the oppressive side,' explained Lois McNay. This issue was clearly an almost impossible one for the panel to grapple with, as some suggested that we should take responsibility for ensuring our clothes are ethically sourced while others thought that was an unfair pressure to put on consumers. Frances Corner said that 'we need to get to a place where buying something which makes you feel good doesn’t come at the expense of someone else, but we need to make our own decisions'. Alison McGovern - who represents many constituents who struggle financially - said that 'they want the power to buy a pair of jeans and be sure they’re not endangering someone’s welfare' but thought it was her job - not theirs - to make that happen.
The Green Party’s Amelia Womack took the debate a step further, arguing that 'having fashion shows twice a year promotes this idea that you need to buy new clothes all the time' while we can probably all agree that that makes total sense - and in fact many fashion houses churn out six collections a year - when McGovern said 'I have to admit I love the catwalks and that thrill of seeing a dress you really like', there were plenty of (slightly guilty?) agreeing nods.
3. The threat to London’s creativity
One of the evening’s most passionate and emotional topics was the current state of London life and the threat that poses to the wellbeing of the creative people who have helped the capital to earn its global reputation. Frances Corner, who sees on a daily basis how rents and employment opportunities are impacting young people, told the room that 'we’ve become a more unequal society and that’s beginning to kill London’s creativity'. A student from Brighton explained that, 'I get so stressed out trying to make ends meet. I want to start my career but I’m always being asked to work for free.'
Perhaps the most shocking and sad element of this issue is that it doesn’t seem to be getting any better for as we reach our mid and late twenties. Lynette Nylander, i-D magazine’s Managing Editor, drew applause when she spoke about the vibrancy which artists, designers and creatives give to London. 'We’re not getting anything in return from this city' she argued, 'it’s become a vicious circle of exploitation.' Whether that’s reflected in pay or rocketing house prices, everyone in the room agreed the London bubble would surely burst at some point.
4. People Power
The most positive message to emerge from the evening’s debate centred on the power of having your voice heard and campaigning for something to happen.
Baroness Young gave Benetton as a recent example; 'they have finally been persuaded, two years after Rana Plaza (the devastating factory fire in Bangladesh), to donate to the survivors’ fund because a million people signed a petition asking them to do it. That’s such a strong sign of power.' As young people use social media in ever-savvier ways, it seems that this could be the new way that we shape politics to suit us.
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Follow Bethan on Twitter: @BethanHolt
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.