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The Paris American Academy, with support from Philip Fimmano, Trend Analyst, Trend Union, will host the second Parisian Salon: The Soul of Fashion to explore a fashion system in transition.

 

 

What does fashion mean in today’s frenetic society? 

The fashion system seems to be increasingly less relevant to consumer lifestyles. What needs to change to make fashion more meaningful? Many companies, brands, designers, and retailers are already re-imagining a new future.  Join the conversation as we probe the Soul of Fashion to imagine a scenario that redefines the fashion system and creates a new equilibrium.  â€‹

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  • What does fashion mean in today's frenetic society?

  • Are we moving from a fashion systems model to a populist model?

  • How is fashion responding to and interacting with the current zeitgeist?

  • Can we embrace change, while still honoring the spirit and essence of fashion?

  • Can a new fashion system be more synergistic with art, architecture, interiors, etc.?

  • What needs to change at the design, marketing, distribution, and consumption levels to make fashion relevant?

  • Is the desire for speed, change, and profits stifling designer creativity?

  • How can fashion better respond to consumer lifestyles and the quest for comfort and function?

  • Who might be the arbiters of taste in a new fashion system and how will they exert their influence?

  • How can we honor and sustain artisanal skills while at the same time embracing and pushing new technology?

  • Does a system based on elite fashion capitals truly represent the multi-cultural world in which we live?

  • Should we we reconsider the implementation of cultural appropriation in fashion?

  • Can we train consumers to rethink their value quotient in terms of price, quality and sustainability?

  • How can fashion become more fluid and less homogeneous

  • What would a more efficient fashion system look like in terms of design process, presentations, and distribution?

What better place than Paris to imagine the future of fashion? The PAA is located in the fifth arrondissement on the left bank of Paris—the center of many of the best-known artistic and literary salons throughout history. The ‘salon’ was the driver of enlightenment in European cities during the early 17th century.  Inspired hosts gathered creative and intellectual thinkers in art, literature, music, philosophy, and/or politics to debate new ideas that nourished an active, intellectual life and enlightened artistic, cultural, and political development. In the digital era the ‘salon’ has been revived to foster a culture of debate and dialogue that allows ideas to mature. Salons dissolve the boundaries between disciplines and schools of thought to bring clarity to complex questions. As these new ideas are disseminated, they help to shape the future (Salon Culture, https://www.edge.org/conversation/andrian_kreye-salon-culture-network-of-ideas). 

 

This format is even more relevant today as a means to propel new ideas in educational pedagogy and business strategy as we move through the creative economy.

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© 2014 by Mary Ruppert-Stroescu. Proudly created with Wix.com

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