Fashion Research
With the spectacular creations we see on the runway, fashion design constitutes a unique field, but outside the reach of the limelight it has traditionally held a marginalised position as a research field. Today, fashion design is high on both the economic and the cultural agenda. The results of recent years’ emphasis on fashion research are now being addressed in two new anthologies, a welcome contribution in the somewhat meagre field of fashion research.
15 November 2011

Are Trends Becoming Obsolete?
- Ph.D. Dissertation on Trend Mechanisms in Fashion.

Trends are not going out of fashion in the 21st century, although they have been pronounced dead repeatedly as a result of the growing turnover rate in fashion trends – they mutate and emerge in a chaotic root system of meanings and functions. In a Ph.D. dissertation from The Danish Design School, Maria Mackinney-Valentin studies how and why fashion trends change, and whether there have been any changes in trend mechanisms in the 21st century. The Ph.D. dissertation helps consolidate and develop trend studies as an independent field of research and contributes to our understanding of trends in our society.
15 June 2010

Global Luxury Fashion Sets the Agenda
Design researcher Erik Hansen-Hansen studies global luxury fashion and is interested in the impact of the global luxury brands on the Danish fashion scene. He believes that they are setting the agenda for much of the world’s fashion industry – thus also affecting Denmark’s. And that it is crucial for Danish fashion companies to understand the international networks of the fashion industry. In February 2010, Erik Hansen-Hansen took part in the Copenhagen Fashion Week to observe how the global luxury brands affect the Danish fashion industry.
16 March 2010

Luxury fashion: Beyond Products
Under the theme "What Drives Fashion?" the Danish Centre for Design Research engaged a fashion researcher, a business director and an editor-in-chief in debate in a research café on 25 April 2008 in connection with the Festival of Research. In a dialogue with the audience, they discussed the whims, temptations and future of fashion. The event closed with a fashion show, where design students and recent design graduates presented their takes on future fashion.
15 May 2008

Interdisciplinary Ph.D. Dissertation is a Weighty Contribution to Danish Design Research
On 14 May 2008, Erik Hansen-Hansen defended his Ph.D. Dissertation at The Danish Design School. The dissertation, entitled ‘Desire, Seduction and Feminine Beauty: Global Luxury Fashion in the Network Economy’ draws on classic fashion theories as well as complexity theory and biological theories in an effort to explore the driving forces behind luxury fashion. The evaluation panel calls the dissertation bold and ambitious and describes it as an important contribution to establishing a Danish fashion research effort, thanks to its broad theoretical base and conceptual clarification.
15 June 2008

The Story Gives Fashion Products Added Value
On 3 February 2009, Marie Riegels Melchior defended her Ph.D. dissertation 'Dansk på mode! En undersøgelse af design, identitet og historie i dansk modeindustri' (Danish in fashion! An examination of design, identity and the history of the Danish fashion industry). She believes that the Danish fashion industry has a development potential that the design education programmes can help bring out by giving future fashion designers greater knowledge of theory and history.
16 March 2009