The portrait of the powerful woman in the context of the evolving fashion industry

Defining a powerful woman has never been so important as it is today. In the recent times, we have witnessed the radical awakening of femininity in our society through the Women’s March, and the ‘Me Too’ movement. One of the most impactful industries on women, namely the fashion industry, has also started becoming more inclusive with respect to body type and age of models on a runaway and in the brand’s marketing campaigns. For instance, in 2018, a plus size model Betsy Teske was the first plus size model to walk the runaway for the luxury fashion house Alexander McQueen. Yasmina Rossi, whose career spiked when she reached 45, has modelled for the luxury brands such as Yves Saint Laureaunt and Hermes and Maye Musk, at the age of 69 has become the face of Cover Girl. The nascent message behind these, still rare, excursions in the beauty/fashion industry is that there should not be a single canon of beauty, but that a woman should be celebrated as an individual, and at any age. The power of a woman comes from her embracing herself, rather than distancing herself from her body, age and individual self-expression, which is what the mainstream industry wants us to believe. No one fits a single, idealized cannon of beauty. This is a strong message, and certainly the one that needs to be more enforced through the industries that have had such an immense impact on women, and, ultimately, their self-worth. The question is how can we make these isolated departures from the mainstream beauty cannons that the beauty/fashion industry become a new norm? Imagine if we achieved so: the benefits would be immense on both the retail end and the consumer end. On the one hand, we would have a happier and empowered consumer who feels validated and who feels her money is spent for a good cause (for instance, investing in brands who are body-type inclusive inspires more creativity, and more diversity!). I believe that no other time would have been most fruitful for changing what is perceived as ‘beautiful’, ‘desirable’ or ‘powerful’ in the context of fashion than now.

As we know, fashion industry is undergoing a major evolution both in terms of the business models behind it, and, I dare say, its role in the society. The industry has become one of the most environmentally harmful and unethical industries. Its neglect disrespect towards its employees at the lowest ends of the production chain, and lack of the control of CO2 emissions harmful to the biodiversity has reached its peak. The industry is in a desperate need for new solutions, new business models that will transform the industry, along with the consumers, to more sustainable and ethical practices that will benefit all parties involved in fashion. New business practices and, consequently, a creation of a new consumer culture requires new language that will be used to refer to the new or redefined concepts in the industry.

Take, for instance, the concept of a powerful woman. A famous quote from Versace’s matriarch Donatella is that she creates clothes which are ‘an armour that makes women feel powerful’. The beautifully tailored black bodycons, wide shouldered midi dresses, with a slightly revealing sensual slit at the waist, combined it with the black and gold 14cm tall cage sandals featuring a Versace medusa, create an image of a strong, edgy, composed, yet feminine woman. The idea of a powerful woman recreated through fashion is, indeed, very attractive from both the consumer and a producer point of view. But given the new trend towards evolved fashion practices, the question is whether Versace’s definition of the powerful feminine sustainable?

Let’s dive deeper into Donatella’s language. Intuitively, ‘the assembly of an armour’ requires awful lot of work; it requires cumulation of pieces; adding more and more, season after season, in order to create the overall look. This is at odds with the less is more’ philosphy of sustainable fashion industry which emphasizes buying fewer high quality and well crafted clothes to be worn often rather than a whole bunch of them to be stashed in the wardrobe, and only to be worn once or twice before being disposed of. So, what does the redefinition of the image, and consequently of a language which defines a powerful woman, the one which is more inclusive and compatible with sustainable fashion look like?

In my opinion, ‘power’ is not trendy, ‘right here, right now’ characteristic, but a quality that is accomplished incrementally, through experience and knowledge, through trials and errors. Once acquired, it becomes an everlasting characteristic. Defined as something durable, ‘power’ in the context of femininity and its representation in the fashion industry, fits the values of the sustainable fashion industry. And here is how.

A powerful woman is a woman who makes responsible fashion choices. A powerful woman makes informed investments. She researches and buys from brands that source their materials

A powerful woman is the one that is not afraid to reveal herself. She does not need to hide behind the armour. She is ready to ‘go seasonless’ (the term was popularized by the creative director of Gucci, Allessandro Michelle) and buy a single piece of clothing that is perfectly tailored and tailored with love.

A powerful woman is a woman that embraces her femininity in a way that is unique to her. She will not compromise her own sense of beauty and style for short-lived trends and, therefore, she is choosing among the brands that celebrate women’s body of different sizes and shapes.

A powerful woman is a woman that empowers other women. This idea can be viewed in a redefined notion of ‘luxury’ in fashion. We could think of ‘luxury’ as a domain where an individual consumer can, in addition to obtaining that perfect piece from a luxury brand, directly donate money that will go for mentoring young artisans in order to promote passing down the craft of clothes making from an older generation of men and women to the younger ones. In this way, we keep the traditions of clothes making unique to different cultures and parts of the world alive and valuable.

As I have illustrated, re-defining the concept of powerful feminine brings in, inevitably, new language (e.g. ‘revealing’, ‘responsible’, ‘knowledgeable’) that can be used in the context of sustainable fashion narrative in regard to femininity.

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