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Conference in Oslo

The Interrogating Intellectual Property Rights: Fashion and Design

This free public conference on 12 June 2015 at the University of Oslo examined the question of fashion and design’s intellectual property rights in the post-war period, by bringing together researchers across fields of law, design and fashion history, business and economic history, and anthropology.

Papers considered a wide range of case studies pertaining to intellectual property rights (IPR) laws in national and international frameworks, the challenges to the enforcement of the law, and the lived effects of the law on the ground.

Principal Investigator Veronique Pouillard-Maliks, University of Oslo, explained the rationale behind the conference:

"Creative industries rely upon composite systems of intellectual property rights, from copyright, patent and design rights to trademark laws that can be used alone or in various combinations in order to protect innovative designs. Innovation in fashion and design is notoriously hard to define and, as such, these industries allow us to question the boundaries of intellectual property and the role of IPR in market and profit protection largely benefitting big players, as well as the complex relations between creativity and copying."

The papers explored a range of exciting cases, from the rise of corporate identity design; criminalization of fashion piracy; a biography of the Danish PH Lamp; and Hells Angels’ tough protection of the power of their gang insignia vis-à-vis fashionable imitators. Speakers from the UK, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and the USA considered questions such as: What counts as original or as an innovation? To what degree should and can these be protected in face of cheap copies and knock-offs flooding the market at an unprecedented speed? And who has the definition power and the leverage in the form of market access and higher levels of protection in foreign markets? Here the ‘gatekeeper’ theme reared its head, as participants deliberated the role of designers, the law and copyright attorneys.

Several of members of the Enterprise of Culture team led the way with new research on intellectual property rights:

Barbara Townley (St Andrews) presented a paper called ‘Fashioning Property: Understandings of Intellectual Property in Fashion and Design’. Drawing on 40 interviews with small Scottish businesses conducted by the St Andrews team, Townley examined the understanding of intellectual property and the role of law in safeguarding business among small and mid-sized firms in the Scottish textile and fashion sectors.

Pouillard-Maliks discussed ‘The New-York Paris Fashion Nexus and the Criminalization of Fashion Piracy: The Milton Affair, 1955-1962’. This case study examined a protracted US legal battle involving Paris couture houses and a New York sketch service, and illuminated the cultural differences in the transatlantic legal context that led to very different perceptions on what material should or should not be allowed through ‘the gates’.

Two other members of the Oslo team, Johanna Zanon and Tereza Kuldova, presented new research on the legal dimensions of the current revival of old Paris couture names, and the legal battle between the British designer Alexander McQueen and Hell’s Angels over the use of gang insignia in high-end fashion, respectively.

The Erasmus team, Ben Wubs and Thierry Maillet, discussed two important fashion trade fairs, Première Vision in Paris and Interstoff in Frankfurt, from a copyright perspective.

Finally, Alan McKinlay (Newcastle) presented a paper on behalf of the Newcastle-Heriot Watt team, ‘Fashioning Brands: Bourdieu, Biba and Beyond, c. 1960-80’. This in-depth case study of the British high street during a transformative period, when small shops yielded to fashion-oriented chains, provided insight into the use of legal protection as a mechanism for building up the brand.

An international roster of guest speakers complemented presentations by the Enterprise of Culture team:

Carma Gorman of the University of Texas at Austin (USA) spoke on ‘Why Postwar American Businesses Embraced Corporate Identity Design’ by examining the importance of the Lanham Act of 1946, which overhauled and modernised federal trademark law in the USA and which led to significant investment in trademark development and corporate identity design.

Roxanne Peters, Intellectual Property Manager at the V&A, presented a talk on ‘Fashion and IP: Creator, Curator, Consumer―Behind the scenes at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London’. This paper considered the challenges faced by the heritage sector in developing spin-off products from fashion objects in the collections.

Stina Teilmann-Lock, from the University of Southern Denmark, discussed ‘The PH Lamp: An IP biography of a Danish design Icon’, with reference to the confusing legal context that led the lamp to be protected as both ‘industrial property’ and ‘artistic property’.

Marianne Dahlén, from the Faculty of Law at the University of Uppsala, discussed the historical development of Swedish intellectual property law in relation to Swedish fashion. Comparisons were made to the US context.

Tania Phipps-Rufus, doctoral candidate at the University of Bristol, presented her preliminary research on ‘Fashion, Intellectual Property and Culture in the Creative Economy’.

The final roundtable discussion with Regina Lee Blaszczyk (University of Leeds); Kjetil Fallan, design historian at the University of Oslo; Kristine Bruland, economic historian at the University of Oslo; and Klaus Nathaus, social historian at the University of Oslo, helped to put the question of intellectual property rights in historical perspective, raising the important question of who benefits from trademark and copyright protection: the creators, the consumers, or the attorneys who act as ‘gatekeepers’.

Full information about this conference can be found here.