This week is a good one for anyone interested in the current state of the fashion industry. I chat with my wonderful colleague, Katriona Flynn. Katriona is a fashion designer and educator, a graduate of the National College of Art & Design (NCAD) here in Dublin, and Central St Martins in London. She went on to design with brands as diverse as Urban Outfitters and the luxury brand Burberry, before joining our fashion buying programme team at TU Dublin over 3 years ago now. Katriona is an absolute tonic to work with, full of enthusiasm and energy, and she loves chatting fashion. So I wanted to pick up with Katriona a conversation I had contributed to a couple of weeks ago with an RTE journalist, about the future of high street fashion, post-Covid and post-Brexit. In the end, we go down various rabbit holes, but it’s all fashion-related, so if you want to hear an academic take on an oft-thought frivolous matter, listen in!

TOPICS INCLUDE: 

• Is fashion brand, Topshop relevant anymore? Will we miss these high street stores on the physical high street? 
•  Why are the less design-led brands surviving the fashion fallout?
• Channel 4's 'Inside Missguided: Made in Manchester' - a sad reflection of what the fashion industry is becoming - more focused on social media & marketing, than product and design
• Dresses for 8p on Pretty Little Things on Black Friday - demeaning to fashion design 
•  The price war is to the detriment of the industry 
• Why are we still over-consuming even in a pandemic when we have nowhere to go?
• Are we addicted to the consumption of fashion?
• Do this generation of fashion consumers just accept low-quality clothing as the norm?
• Future of Fashion: People, Planet & Profit
• Will we care more about the fashion industry after this pandemic? Care where our clothes came from, and care who made them?
• Fashion: all an illusion, concealing a nightmare - All Smoke & Mirrors
• Opportunity for digital technology to reduce waste in the sampling & developing process in luxury brands
• Check your care labels!!
• Garments made to become obsolete - hard-wearing clothing seen as unprofitable to the fashion industry
• Ultimately, there is need for regulation in the fashion industry to instigate the urgent change we need to save our planet 
• Is the meaning of 'sustainability' & 'luxury' lost in fashion?
• Is fashion all a little soulless right now? 
• You are what you wear - fashion & identity 
• Karl Marx & commodity fetishism - the problematic separation of consumption from production 
• Future of the high street? Brands with a point of difference will survive
• Market share & brand personas

RESOURCES MENTIONED:
The Psychology of Fashion by Dr. Carolyn Mair: 
https://www.apa.org/research/action/speaking-of-psychology/fashion
Channel 4's Inside Missguided: Made in Manchester:
https://www.channel4.com/programmes/inside-missguided-made-in-manchester/episode-guide/
________________________________________________________
Subscribe to YouTube channel: https://bit.ly/3jLTdaq
Rate & review on iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/ie/podcast/journeying/id1529912826
Like Facebook Page: https://bit.ly/33kp4bU
Visit the Journeying website: https://journeying.me/