The scope of this thesis is to reveal the hidden dimensions of fashion. With the aim to stress the worth of participation and the individual experience of fashion. This work is questioning what we see, and later what is actually there. Through a thorough investigation of the knit technique the relationship of loop and thread (pause and activity) is the focus of this paper. Enhancing the significant qualities of the knitted technique, where material and shape is born simultaneously, the result presented holds a variety of results. With the aim to discuss multiple dimensions this knit investigation is presented in a fashion context. Styled with technical sportswear this work is challenging knitwear -as well as sportswear. By clashing sports connotated materials with the knitted wool, both fields are expanded and new options and expression are presented. The motive of this investigation is to further state the worth of fashion. To create a space for the experience of fashion, stating the various result that is not depending on the presentation on body. This work questions the pre-set truths and conventions of what fashion could be, and our ability to judge what is presented for us.

This work explores the interactive use of mirrored and reflective materials in the context of fashion. It draws parallels between the way in which it has been used in architecture in comparison to fashion and seeks a way to make a fair translation between the two mediums. The motive behind this work lies in the curiosity to explore reflective mirror materials in clothing beyond simply as shiny surface materials and aims instead to explore its illusive properties when combined with archetypical pattern prints. This to explore the potential aesthetic expressions it could bring to the fashion field. Using the theoretical approach of convergence, divergence, and transformation by Jones and methods by Thornquist that was slightly modified and reworked to fit the context of this project. Investigations with the reflective material were tested in different scales, both by draping with the material as is and by cutting and placing it in different ways in relation to the printed textile material. Derived from these experiments a new illusive material was created with special draping and shaping properties that came to define the collection as a whole.

The purpose of this research was to identify the legging features that athleisure consumers desire and the performance problems they frequently encounter. A non-probability sample (n=133) of college students who identified as female and wore leggings for non-athletic purposes were surveyed. The questionnaire was designed based upon examination of online product reviews and current complaints with legging products. The results of the survey were used to design and complete a laboratory evaluation. Laboratory samples and methods were then chosen to assess the performance qualities desired when purchasing leggings and the problems encountered when wearing leggings by the surveyed consumers. Three brands were identified by the survey as regularly consumed legging brands and included: Lululemon, Nike, and 90 Degree. All laboratory samples were a nylon, spandex blend fabric. Garments were laundered and evaluated after one, five, ten, and twenty washes. All evaluations were completed in a Textile Testing Laboratory according to AATCC and ASTM standard test methods.

Esta pesquisa trata da divulgação e uso de peças comumente relacionadas ao vestuário masculino por mulheres no Brasil entre 1851 a 1911. A partir de pesquisa em jornais, que divulgavam tal moda, e de retratos fotográficos, que permitiram reconhecer o uso desta moda no país, foram feitas reflexões sobre que mulheres poderiam usar tal moda e em que contextos. Paletós, coletes, gravatas e calças foram os artefatos privilegiados nas análises para compreender os sentidos construídos em torno deles e os impactos provocados nas dinâmicas corporais e sociais que tais peças produziram. / This research focuses on both the advertisement and actual wearing of pieces commonly related to mens clothing by women in Brazil ranging from 1851 to 1911. Starting from publications of the period focused on new fashion trends and photographs the research was able to find evidence of such fashion trends in the country. Reflections were made on limiting which women were able to wear such fashion trends and in which contexts they were allowed to. Coat, vests, ties and trousers constitute privileged artifacts for a deeper comprehension on the significances surrounding them and the impacts they have caused on bodily and social dynamics that resulted from them.

The purpose and underlying motivation for this project was to examine the procedure of garment construction methods, by specifically choosing to abandon traditional rules and standards that are associated with mass production. I chose to explore domestic hand-craft made by women in New Zealand in their domestic situation, focusing on hand-stitched techniques from the past reflecting a nostalgic value which potentially contributed to the garment’s construction process. The project sought to utilize the re-using of materials by incorporating previously made hand-craft; and looked at the remaking of second-hand garments by means of deconstruction and reconstruction. Traditional hand-craft, in this context, refers to the use of craft forms not governed by principles of efficiency, mass production or technology, allowing the garments to contain unique ‘one of a kind’ hand-made qualities. My studio practice specifically focused on exploring the relationship between hand-craft and garment construction, by researching their application and integration into the garment’s structure, along with disrupting the orderly traditional production process. I was not focusing on the finished garment’s design. The project provided an opportunity to refocus my attention on the hand-made, as I perceived that the skills required to produce these were being extinguished by modern lifestyles. Exploration promoted new discoveries by exposing the construction process and revealing unpredicted combinations. The project explored these ideas, resulting in a range of women’s garments that revealed, as part of their construction, hand-work which offered a modern variation of nostalgia. This project comprised of 80% practical work and will be accompanied by an exegesis with a value of 20%.

Recently some language courses based on so-called “fashion language” were developed in different countries, particularly in England, Italy and France. We predict that Chinese “fashion language” will become important in the world of fashion design and a course on Chinese “fashion language” will be in great demand by people working in the fashion industry. It is noticed that students studying Chinese in regular classes are not able to read fashion magazines and utilize “fashion language” because it includes special terminology and stylistics. “Fashion language” is a language for specific purpose (LSP) and as any LSP it has specific features. This study focuses on the features of “fashion Chinese” by analyzing the texts of Elle Taiwan, Vogue Taiwan, Marie Claire Taiwan magazines and fashion resource Style.com.tw. We have applied corpus ananlysis in our research, and recommendations for a language course on “fashion Chinese” are given in the final part of the study.

<p>Title: The decisive opinion - A qualitative study of consumers opinions of eight Swedish fashion companies.</p><p>Seminar date: 2008-01-14</p><p>Course: Candidate thesis media and communication, 15 ECTS,</p><p>Authors: Micela Danielsson, Frida Åhs</p><p>Advisor: Larsåke Larsson</p><p>Five keywords: Profile, Image, Brand, Fashion and Advertising</p><p>Purpose: The purpose with this study is to evaluate and discuss the connection between profile and the companies’ image in the eye of the consumer.</p><p>Methodology: A qualitative method has been used in the paper, focusgruops interview with respondents from Örebro.</p><p>Theoretical perspectives: The overall theory of the paper is describing fashion theory. profile, identity and image and advertising.</p><p>Empirical foundation: Consumers from Örebro have made a contribution to the basis of our empirical study.</p><p>Conclusions: The results show that fashion and clothes play a big part for the consumers and they ascribe it the part as a way to show their identity, image and express them selves. For none of the companies profile and image did not have a full connection, but a lot of times there were parts of the profile and image that had a connection. The questioned states that they get their opinions from merchandise, stores, store employees and different kinds of advertising. The respondents situation as students had an effect on their opinions, primarily because of their economical situation. They also had a larger opinion of the fashion companies that are larger fashion chains than the companies that represented the smaller ones and the questioned stated that it could depend on that the larger fashion chains focused more on a wider market than the smaller ones. The result showed also that different communication strategies that the respondents primarily noticed were TV-commercials but also other forms of advertising.</p>

<p><strong>Background:</strong> Over the past few years Swedish fashion has expanded and gained attention, both in Sweden and abroad. Every year fashion weeks take place around the world with the purpose of showcasing fashion designers new collections for the up-coming season.</p><p>Fashion week in Sweden is arranged in Stockholm four times a year in the end of January, in February, in the turn of June and July and in August. The different occasions have different activities and focus. The main focus of January and June/July are fashion shows and the main focus of February and August are trade fairs for buyers and wholesalers. The fashion shows and trade fairs are closed to the public, but other fashion events directed to the public takes place during these weeks. Seeing as many stakeholders are involved in fashion week they all have some kind of relationship to one another. This makes fashion week in Stockholm an interesting case to study and analyze from a sociological theoretical approach.</p>

<p>The fashion industry is one of the most exciting and fast-moving industries in the worldand the companies within the fashion industry are driven by the reputation of their brand.(Hines and Bruce, 2001) Some celebrities and athletes use their names as a label so that the wearer associates the clothes with the person, and therefore that brand takes on the image of the celebrity. This research is concentrated on the customers of a particular fashion company, Björn Borg. In the fashion industry, it is not only important who is wearing the brand, but also who is not wearing the brand, which leads to the aim of this paper: Can a company sacrifice its brand image if it holds on to all of its customers,including those outside of its target market? From our research, we were able to draw the following conclusions: The customers within the target group associate the brand with some of the characteristics of customers outside the target group and, thus, the image of Björn Borg is slightly different from what the company would like their image to be. Our analysis reveals that there are many who associate the brand with older people. In a way, the older customers may influence the younger ones into thinking the brand is for an older age group. Also, many associate the brand with the “average joe” and with the tennis player despite the efforts of the company to create a special brand, not average, that stands apart from the tennis player, Björn Borg. Therefore, our study indicates that a company can sacrifice brand image if it holds on to all customers including those outside their target market.</p>

The adoption process is an information seeking and information-processing activity (Rogers, 1983,p. 21). Fashion information which consumers receive from various sources directly affects their decision to adopt or reject a style (Sproles, 1979, p. 173). Research has shown that consumers vary in their use of fashion information sources during the adoption process based upon their level of fashion leadership and demographic characteristics such as age and sex. However, little is known about the influence of cultural values on the fashion adoption process. As apparel manufacturing and retailing companies increase global marketing efforts, further understanding of cross-cultural differences in consumer behavior during the fashion adoption process is needed. The present study explored the influence of cultural values on fashion information seeking during the adoption process. The purpose of the present study was to compare Korean and U.S. college women's fashion information seeking. Comparisons were made on two levels: (1) between fashion leaders and followers within each culture and (2) between Korean fashion leaders and U.S. leaders. The type of information sources (categorized as marketer dominated, consumer dominated and neutral sources) used at the selected stages of the adoption process model as depicted in Sproles model (1979, p. 197) (awareness of object, interest and evaluation) was investigated. Frequency of use and variety of fashion information sources used by consumers were also examined. The subjects of the present study were a purposive sample of 95 Korean and 82 U.S. college women, recruited from clothing and merchandising courses at Chungnam National University and Seoul National University in Korea and at Oregon State University during 1993 Spring term. Data were collected through the use of a self-administered questionnaire. The questionnaire consisted of four parts: (1) fashion innovativeness and fashion opinion leadership scales, (2) questions asking fashion information sources used at the selected stages of the adoption process, (3) a scale to measure frequency and variety of fashion information sources used, and (4) questions asking demographic characteristics of the subjects. The questionnaire was first developed in English and translated into Korean. To confirm the equivalency of the two versions, the Korean questionnaire was back-translated into English. The questionnaire was also pre-tested for clarity with subjects from the same population as the sample. The data were analyzed by Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and chi-square analysis. Fashion leaders were those who were self-identified as fashion opinion leaders or fashion innovators. 31.6% of the Korean sample (n=30) and 47.6% of the U.S. sample (n=39) were classified as fashion leaders. Korean fashion leaders were found to use marketer dominated sources at the awareness of object stage more than did U.S. leaders. No differences were found in the type of information sources at the interest and evaluation stages between Korean fashion leaders and U.S. leaders. Through all the stages of the adoption process, the Korean leaders used foreign fashion magazines and non-fashion magazines (advertisements and fashion columns) as fashion information sources more than did U.S. fashion leaders. U.S. fashion leaders showed a greater frequency of use of consumer dominated sources than Korean leaders. No difference was found in variety of fashion information sources used by Korean fashion leaders and U.S. leaders. For both Korean and U.S. consumers, fashion leaders had a greater frequency of use and a greater variety of fashion information sources used than followers. Similar to what had been found with U.S. consumers, Korean fashion leaders may prove to be an effective target for fashion marketing efforts. / Graduation date: 1994