They say they love my ass in Seven Jeans, True Religion / I say no, but they keep givin’
The NYtimes details the work of a knock off fashion designer, Seema Anand, who literally takes pictures of items on runways and then has sowers in India make the clothes, getting them on the racks before the high end products hit their boutiques and high end clothing stores. Many of the designs are strikingly similiar, one might call them copies. But since only distinctive patterns (like Burberry’s) and logos are copyrighted – cuts, colors and designs are all fair game. The designers want to intervene and copyright their designs to fight the knocks offs. I’m unsympathetic — the purpose of copyright is to serve the public good, not the good of designers who want to sell dresses for 800 dollars. Are fewer high end clothes being made, are designs less adventurous and original? Also, how do you copyright a cut or design? What if a fashion innovation, like boot cut jeans, was copyrighted? Would the public be well served by one company making boot cut jeans for 100 years? One part of the article, however, illuminates the frustration for the high end designers and the opportunities for Anand:
“Some people don’t want to spend $300 on a pair of jeans just because of the name,” said Siovhan McGearey, 16, from London. “They may look nice, but why pay $300 when you can go down the street to Forever 21 and get jeans that are $30 that look exactly the same?”
Tags: Impetuous Young Whippersnapper, Knockoffs, Matt Zeitlin, NYtimes, Seema Anand
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