Year one: What difference does nation make?

The first five months of the Enterprise of Culture (1 August to 31 December 2013) were spent laying a strong foundation for the three-year project. Considerable administrative activity took place at the lead organization, the University of Leeds, allowing the Principal Investigators at other institutions to launch their research agendas. Fiona Blair joined the Leeds team as Project Administrator and the project website was created.

The Enterprise of Culture (EOC) was formally launched at the University of Leeds at a public conference in December 2013. Project work undertaken from early 2014 onwards built on the foundation laid in the latter half of 2013.

Following on from our launch event, the EOC team sponsored three public conferences over 2014, added several staff members who augment our expertise, and made strides with original research on the fashion industry since 1945, which will result in major publications over the next few years.

The theme for year one allowed the research teams to explore the question of national identity and its relationship to the European fashion business.

Immediately after World War II, the idea of nationhood dominated management thought, design culture, and fashion creation in men‘s and women‘s clothing and apparel. This intense period of fashion nationalism paralleled European reconstruction. As the nation-states rebuilt their political and economic systems, the fashion industries in Italy, France, Belgium, Sweden and the UK established themselves as arbiters of a new economic order and helped create or re-create communities and traditions.

A series of team workshops and public conferences explored these ideas. The public conferences allowed the academic PIs to interact with curators of textiles and fashion and with design and management professionals from the European fashion business.