FASHION AND POLITICS

photo by Alistair Guy, courtesy of the BFC

... even though she poses in front of a somewhat grey London sky hanging over a muddy river Thames here, Caroline Rush, CEO of the British Fashion Council, is a very, well, sunny character. I met her this summer to conduct an interview for the newspaper, and we talkd about the responsibility and tasks of the BFC. I found it very interesting to hear about the importance of fashion's digestibility:

"For the London Development Agency, the aim was also to strengthen London Fashion Week: if you've got a firm position among the world's four leading fashion capitals, this will help in terms of inward investment and strengthening the city and council itself. So the mayor of London has got a very clear message about London as a creative capital, and clearly fashion is a very strong communicator and a very digestible way to communicate the excitement and creativity that we've got around."

An interesting, and very down-to-earth way to look at things. Fashion as a communicator, fashion as a tool for regional politics?

I guess that other allegedly CREATIVE cities would like to do the same, but for obvious reasons, London always does the trick a little bit better ...