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B.A.F.F.L.E.D. Fashion Law

Fashion Law Gets Accredited!

Ms. Susan Scaffidi has done it again!  She continues to take our beloved niche to the next level, with the Fashion Law Institute at Fordham School of Law now offering an LL.M. in Fashion Law.  An M.S.L. for nonlawyers will be offered as well.

Offering part-time and full-time programs, this feat is a major step for the fashion law niche.  After opening the Fashion Law Institute in 2010, the notariety and reality of its need became clearer and clearer.  I even had the joy of attending the annual Symposium in  2013.  It was amazing!  Fashion trailblazer  Diane von Furstenberg will provide seed money for the program and continue as an advisor to the Institute.  She's been pivitol to its success from the start.

Congrats a zillion to Fordham and the Fashion Law Institute.  We're so excited about this next step!


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B.A.F.F.L.E.D. Fashion Law

How to Spot Fake Merchandise--

This topic has been visited a few times--on this site through various posts, and by some of our fashion law friends.  However, a reminder is always good, especially as e-commerce continues to dominate.  We want to make sure you're fully aware of what you're buying, and why you shouldn't be buying items not properly sourced to the right designer.


 Here's some guidance on purchasing the right pieces:

It's improperly placed
If it's not in an approved retailer, is positioned in a mall kiosk, or is sold on a street corner or out of a trunk--it's fake!

The price is too good to be true
Real luxury goods come at a cost.  When you enter their stores, they'll tell you you're making and investment, not a purchase.  If the price is way beyond right, it's not real.  No hardworking designer--established or rising--is short selling their work.

It doesn't look quite right
Does the design look just a tad bit off?  Are the letters skewed?  Are the letters wrong?!  If anything about the item is not right--it's fake.  Artists are perfectionists, and they don't let imperfect products hit the market.  If an item looks off, don't buy it.

The signs are obvious
This is when logos are incorrect.  Trademarks are terribly infringed, and real artistry is compromised.  You know you are dealing with a fake when all of the 3 above are present.  You can also be sure when the seller can barely give you facts about the brand.  Frequenting designer shops--even department stores--you'll find knowledgeable sales associates who know about what their selling.  When you can't get a straight story on what you're buying, keep your money.

It's produced in the gray market  
Gray market goods skirt the line of infringement.  Their crafty, shifty ways to make goods seem legit.  They're not.  Gray market goods are produced at legitimate factories, but under illegitimate terms.  These goods are categorically fake.  Don't support them.  They're made contrary to the factory's terms with the designer, skim designers of their rightful money, and impair brand quality in the market.  How would you want your hard work treated?  As Fashion Law Trailblazer Susan Scafidi points out in this news spot on Superfakes, these items often fund organized crime and terrorism.

We often tell you how goods are found in the market, but here is another reminder:
The Rating System
(1) The real thing
(2) The real thing....but the designer finds something about it imperfect for sale
(3) A great fake; looks real, but it's not.  We still discourage purchase of these.
(4) A terrible fake.  Sellers and buyers should know and do better.  Smh.

Be careful when shopping and make sure your purchases are legit on all levels.  For more, check out our 3-part series on The Battle Against Counterfeits.  




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B.A.F.F.L.E.D. Fashion Law

The Movement Continues!

It wasn't all that long ago our Fashion Law Friend Staci Riordan wrote about The Movement that is Fashion Law.  She noted how the niche is growing and something to be taken quite seriously.  Literally following in the heels of Susan Scafidi, who is beyond major in putting our niche on the map, the reality of fashion law is continuing to make waves.

At the hands of Staci, Loyola Law School in California will be launching the Fashion Law Project--a department in the law school dedicated to this stylishly growing field of law.  We are so excited for Staci, and the many law students who will get the chance to study Fashion Law at Loyola.  


The Fashion Law Project, like its big sister in NYC, the Fashion Law Institute, will include classes like Fashion Law Business Transactions, Fashion Modeling Law, and even a Fashion Law Clinic.  

As you all know, Fashion Law is really the reason this blog exists.  Seeing this niche grow the way it has and continues to, will keep us bringing you all the Fashion Law news, updates, and runway shows you need to stay in the know.

Can't wait to see where the next Fashion Law program will pop up!!


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B.A.F.F.L.E.D. Fashion Law

Happy Birthday Fordham Fashion Law Institute!!

 Not too long ago, fashion law was a twinkle in our eye.  And now the Fashion Law Institute, a landmark fixture in the industry, is turning 2 years old!  We are so excited about this feat.  For those of us who love fashion law, we know how important this is.

Our fashionable trailblazer in fashion law, Susan Scafidi, set out to make this Institute her baby, and has taken it all the way down the catwalk.  I got the privilege of visiting and was beyond amazed at what she has put her stiletto print into.  Glamorous kudos to her!  

 In addition to being the author of Counterfeit Chic, she is also the brains and fashionable attorney/Academic Director behind the Fashion Law Institute at Fordham Law School.  For years, so many of us just wanted a class on fashion in law school--now, we have an entire Institute.  The Institute offers a clinic, bootcamp, and help to the fashion district, and seminars for practicing attorneys living and loving the field.  It also happens to be located right in the Fashion District.  How perfect!

 Happy Birthday!!
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B.A.F.F.L.E.D. Fashion Law


Is there a Place for Fashion Law in the Caribbean?

By Contributing Editor, Sonya Stewart

Fashion Law’s place within the legal field cannot be denied. As Entertainment Law came into its own by way of a compilation of several legal disciplines; so too has Fashion Law as the cultural and economic importance of the fashion industry increases on a daily basis. Now classified as a movement in the legal arena, Fashion Law has been gracing law firms, court rooms and fashion houses with its presence in the United States, Canada, Europe, South America... but what about the Caribbean?

Susan Scafidi, the first professor to ever offer a course in Fashion Law tells us that -as long as there have been people making clothes, there have been occasions to consult lawyers[1]- then there is no denying that as the fashion and apparel industry accounts for 4% of the Global GDP (a sum in excess of 1 trillion per year)[2]; an industry of this size would undoubtedly engender reoccurring legal problems and concerns.

So the next step would be to examine the Caribbean’s fashion industry. Is there a fashion industry in the Caribbean? Is this industry such that would propel the need for a legal discipline in its own right to combat the peculiar challenges of fashion entities-these entities being fashion houses, designers, modeling agencies, models, department stores and anyone working within the apparel and accessories industry?

Suffice it to say, the Caribbean does have a fashion industry, where "according to rough estimates, the Caribbean Fashion Industry — English, French, Spanish and Dutch — is conservatively worth J$10 billion ($111.1million USD) per year. Given the relative infancy and underdevelopment of the regional industry, one could assume a value of 10 times this amount, once fully developed[3]” as noted by Kingsley Cooper, Chairman of the Caribbean Fashion Industry Association, CEO of Pulse Models and mastermind behind Caribbean Fashion Week.

In 2007, deputy Prime Minister of Barbados Mia Motley spoke of the importance of the fashion industry to Barbados’ development: “I am confident that fashion could provide an export base for Barbados…we have the wisdom of investing in Intellectual Property and the rewards it offers”[4].

With such an achievement and promising future, there is no doubt that there are and will be many legal issues surrounding Caribbean fashion. In fact, there are a myriad of examples of intellectual property issues in Caribbean fashion (of which I’ll give an example) which a learned fashion law student, fashion blogger and fashion lawyer knows is only one of the basic pillars of fashion law. To the fashion law virgin, the discipline also entails business and finance [advertising law, commercial sales, real estate law (or real property/land law as classified in the Caribbean)] international trade and government regulations (customs, employment law, safety and sustainability) and customer culture and civil rights[5].

Take for example, in 2011 when Caribbean International Fashion Week appropriated Pulse’s Caribbean Fashion Week’s logo in advertisements for the event to be held the same week as the Caribbean event and even started off using the name “Caribbean Fashion Week”[6]. Luckily CFW’s creator, Kingsley Cooper, an attorney at law; quickly got an injunction from a court to stop the misappropriation of the Caribbean event.

The popularity of Pulse’s yearly staging of CFW cannot be disputed as well. In June 2012, a total of 51 collections from 50 designers took to the runway in Kingston (Jamaica), the fashion capital of the Caribbean over a four day period. Designers came from Barbados, Haiti, Turks and Caicos, Trinidad & Tobago, Belize, Suriname, The Dominican Republic as well as from the UK and US.  

Within the fashion apparel academic sphere as well, we have seen the emergence of the importance of legal knowledge related to the business of fashion. The Caribbean Academy of Fashion and Design (CAFD) at the University of Trinidad & Tobago’s (which offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree in Fashion Design) co-program leader and fashion management coordinator Lisa Sinanan exclaims that “it’s a billion-dollar industry and it can be dog-eat-dog as well. You have to be able to know how to ensure that your designs are not stolen, how to protect yourself. That is why we have taught the students about business law, intellectual property rights and copyrights”[7].

An extrapolation of the figures related to the Caribbean fashion industry illustrates that there is more than a place for Fashion Law in the Caribbean. I say the practice of Fashion Law already exists in the Caribbean by an extension of legal representation for fashion clients; but its recognition as a distinctive field in Commonwealth Caribbean law does not exist, at least not yet (but that’s just my opinion).

There has to be acceptance by the Commonwealth Caribbean legal fraternity for lawyers in the region to consider themselves “fashion lawyers”. As beautifully stated by author and Professor at the Fashion Institute of Technology, Guillermo Jimenez “tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars…can turn on the interpretation of the wording in a fashion contract; lawyers, judges, and juries now need to understand what fashion is and how the industry operates. Fashion companies now require the very finest legal counsel”[8].

With that we can accept that as the Caribbean fashion industry grows, so too will the need for Commonwealth Caribbean judges, juries and lawyers to understand the uniqueness of Caribbean fashion. It is fair to accept that fashion law has a place in the Caribbean. The region must now develop legal tools to facilitate the Caribbean fashion industry as every business needs legal support so why not the business of Caribbean fashion?





[1] Fashion Law http://intro.counterfeitchic.com/
[2] Michael Flanagan How Retailers Source Apparel, Just-Style. Jan 2005
[3] Jamaica Observer “Regional fashion industry worth $10 billion a year — Cooper” June 2012

[5] Susan Scafidi Flat Fashion Law! The Launch of a Label-And a New Branch of Law. Jan 2012
[8] Jimenez & Kolsun. Fashion Law: A Guide for Designers, Fashion Executives and Attorneys Fashion Law: Overview of a New Legal Discipline

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