When should a trouser be quilted?

Milan Fashion Week was launched into controversy over the weekend. As reported in the Guardian today and on Radio 4's Today programme, Giorgio Armani has alleged that Dolce & Gabbano's latest collection (unveiled on Friday) contains a pair of quilted trousers (see image) that were a copy of his design from a previous season.


Armani is quoted as saying, "Now they are copying, later they will learn". For their part, D&G deny any copying and said that "Stylistically the Armani style is not and has never been, an inspiration source for us and we stopped seeing his fashion shows years ago". While clearly Giorgio Armani feels taken advantage of, Donatella Versace seems to adopt a more relaxed approach - she was reported as saying, " It's an honour to be copied".

There has always been a fine line between plagiarism and inspiration and the fashion industry is prone to disputes concerning the originality of designs. Menswear is arguably more vulnerable to these types of claims than others given the relatively limited design freedom in standard pieces such as mens tailoring.

Whether Armani is sufficiently vexed to instruct lawyers remains to be seen. While he may or may not feel morally wronged, the question of whether he has a legal case is tricky. If Armani's earlier design is less than 3 years old, it may be protected by Community unregistered design right. If that is the case, as well as proving copying, Armani's lawyers would also have to show that D&G's quilted trousers produce on the so-called "informed user" (so a snappy dresser) the same overall impression as that produced by Armani's earlier design.

While the Community unregistered design right has been successfully relied upon by a number of fashion houses in court cases filed against high street retailers, Fashionista is not aware of any cases between named designers.

"The bag doesn't know it's a bag ..."

Canada's Eye Weekly carries a punchy piece, "The Louis Vuitton Con", by Rea McNamara, which discusses the ideas of Marcus Boon, an academic whose forthcoming book In Praise of Copying seems guaranteed to raise a storm. McNamara writes:

"Western society inherited from Plato the most popular concept of copying, that "everything is a copy" (also known as mimesis). Heidegger would later say that mimesis equals copying a presentation — “all copies are made and produced” quoted Boon — and the parodying of something in a manner. How’s a bag then the imitation of an idea?

Perhaps it has something to do with our concept of luxury. Boon showed an original 1927 Louis Vuitton ad with this delicious sales pitch: “The trunks that last a lifetime… is French but LOOKS French… not only IS the finest but APPEARS the finest.” The idea of an "essential" LV outward appearance is complicated, a sameness not easily differentiated between a real Canal Street stall with fake product and the faux Louis Vuitton stall (with real product) installed outside the Brooklyn Museum for their Takashi Murakami retrospective (the Japanese artist famously re-made the LV monogram in "super-flat" technicolour). Outsourced manufacturing muddies it further — is the Louis Vuitton bag really French? LV artistic director Marc Jacobs is American, after all".

The article continues in much the same vein, with lots of philosophical points to ponder. For example,

"Louis Vuitton would like you to believe in their version of a "projected" fixed original essence. But a bag isn’t really a living entity is it? It can’t do transcendence. The bag doesn’t know it’s a bag, and while Vuitton would lead you to believe that designation is key (neat seams, hologram authenticity cards, serial codes), it’s obviously unstable".

Fashionista awaits the publication of Professor Boon's book with interest and trusts that, in view of its title and its author's thesis, it will not be burdened by the presence of a copyright notice.