Fashion Law: Regulation of the Fashion and Creative Industries

On 10 May, the Youth Legal Forum held on the opening day of the 11th St. Petersburg International Legal Forum hosted a session entitled ‘Fashion Law: Regulation of the Fashion and Creative Industries’.

During the discussion, the speakers highlighted the problems faced by designers, people in the creative professions and industries, as well as the legal instruments aimed at protecting this sector.

In order to develop and gain competitiveness, the Russian contemporary fashion market must now take into account those fashion trends and tendencies in which Russia is 2–3 years behind European countries.

Fashion law is not only a complex phenomenon, but also an interdisciplinary one.  The legal situation in the field of fashion is regulated by many branches of law, but above all by civil law (copyright protection and labour law), administrative law (liability issues) and commercial law (commercialization).

Svetlana Gracheva, Dean of the Faculty of Theory and History of Art of Ilya Repin St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, shared her thoughts on what fashion is and what place it occupies in the modern world. She suggests distinguishing between two types of fashion: fashion as high art and fashion as an industry. The speaker believes that there is a big gap between the achievements of high fashion and mass fashion. “Those who are proficient in marketing technologies and the art of advertising can enter the creative industry system more successfully, while it is much more difficult for a creative person who only knows a craft to do so. We need to create conditions in which creative people can fulfil their true potential and bring their achievements to the masses,” said Svetlana Gracheva.

The topic of fashion law was continued by Valentina Rostovschikova, Chairman of the Board of Fashion Hub Russia Group of Companies; Member of the General Council of the International Buyers Association International Buyers Hub. According to her, “the development of our fashion brands takes place against all odds, and the fashion industry is the most unprotected in the legal sense.” The speaker believes that the industry is unprotected at almost all stages: “There is a lack of understanding of how a brand works in the market; there is a lack of expertise, which makes it impossible to protect that brand; it’s hard to understand how to attract investment for brand development, etc.” There is no single agency to oversee these areas. She suggested creating an agency to promote this business and forming an expert community to audit brands. Valentina Rostovschikova also stressed the need to create conditions for legal protection of both customers and brands themselves.

The session raised issues of plagiarism, copyright and proprietary technology protection, trademark registration and design patenting.

Anastasia Dudko, Attorney, Senior Associate of Intellectual Property and Dispute Resolution Practice at BGP Litigation, listed four main areas of intellectual property protection in the fashion industry – copyright, trademark registration, patent law, and protection of trade secrets (proprietary know-how).

According to participants, there are multiple legal challenges in the fashion and new legal instruments are needed in this fast-growing industry.

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