Rachel Wu

This project stemmed from the growth in the number of people being interested in communism as a movement. Highlighted by the Instagram bios that state ‘communist’ as a personality trait and posters that line the walls of central London advertising Karl Marx walking tours and the general anti-capitalist movements seen in protests and ‘eat the rich’ ideologies propagated on social media.

The fact that this growth in interest exists mainly among young people in the creative fields was confusing to me. Coming from a family where on one side, they struggled through communism and the other that spearheaded the movement, it gave me an intimate insight into what life was like on both sides in a country where communism was implemented. I was confused to learn that people were suddenly looking back towards it as a social structure they wanted implemented, especially within fashion because the industry itself opposes such a movement. Fashion as it is sometimes referred to as, ‘Capitalism’s favourite child’, as an industry that is entrenched within consumerism it can be seen as peculiar that people within this industry are now leaning politically towards a movement that completely contradicts the industry’s foundations.

The collection aims to depict an ideology and reflect the current climate within young communists within the creative industries by juxtaposing the visuals of communist china and couture. It acts as visual commentary of the youth population that grew up within a capitalist society and reaps its benefits but still yearns for communism. I am doing this by creating a collection containing juxtaposing schools of thought that reflect the way we grew up and translating this visually by combining the utilitarianism of communist dress and opposing it with the maximalism of couture to represent capitalism.