Controversy on the Burberry Runway
In the midst of London fashion week, Burberry found itself in the headlines for one design in particular. The attention isn’t due to a remarkable new line; on the contrary, Burberry is now in hot water after sending a hoodie down the runway which featured drawstring resembling a noose. Burberry joins a slew of other high fashion brands who have released overwhelmingly insensitive designs over the last few months, including Gucci and Prada who had to pull product due to its disturbing likeness to black face.
Burberry’s design is troubling for a number of reasons, one being the noose’s inseparable history with lynching in the United States. Another obvious reason the design is clearly in poor taste is the connotation with suicide, a point brought up by one of Burberry’s own models, Liz Kennedy. Kennedy, who walked in the show in which the hoodie was featured, took to Instagram to express her disappointment in the brand. “Suicide is not fashion,” Kennedy said. “It is not glamorous nor edgy and since this show is dedicated to the youth expressing their voice, here I go.” Kennedy is referring to a-now-deleted Instagram post made by Riccardo Tisci, chief creative officer for Burberry, in which he stated he was dedicating the show to the youth and for them “having the courage to scream for what they believe in.” As Kennedy points out, there is an unignorable issue in featuring this hoodie at all, let alone in a line dedicated to young people. The noose drapes provocatively around the model’s neck, creating a dangerous connotation by sending a warped message that glamorizes suicide. The lack of severity the noose was treated with seems clear in Kennedy’s post as she claims, “they briefly hung one [a noose] from the ceiling (trying to figure out the knot) and were laughing about it in the dressing room.”
It is also ironic that Tisci dedicates this show to young people standing up for their beliefs when Kennedy claims she tried to point out the problem of featuring this hoodie, and was shut down. In the same Instagram post, Kennedy continues that an undisclosed person working on the line told her “it’s fashion. Nobody cares about what’s going on in your personal life so just keep it to yourself.”’ That is precisely the problem; it is not simply fashion. Art, of any form, does not get a free pass at creating disrespectful, insensitive imagery or statements in the name of “art”. Especially in a situation like this when an emotionally and historically charged image is used as a prop with no regard to the context it exists within. The hoodie’s purpose was not to make any sort of artistic claim in the name of fashion; it was to attract attention.
After receiving widespread backlash, Marco Gobbetti, Burberry’s chief executive officer, apologized stating, “Though the design was inspired by the marine theme that ran throughout the collection, it was insensitive and we made a mistake”. Claiming the design was the result of some type of marine or nautical theme is a slap in the face to all who see the noose of this hoodie and are immediately taken to much darker subjects than boating. A noose in today’s world is not associated with boating knots; it is associated with tragedy and death. Furthermore, there are countless knots the brand could have implemented to go along with a marine theme; a noose was used to take advantage of the emotional charge around it and within it. Many people are dumbfounded how something like this could have been overlooked in such a huge brand. The truth is that Burberry most likely sent the hoodie down the runway knowing the connotations.
A week after Burberry’s initial apology, they announced on Instagram a plan to increase diversity and cultural understanding within the brand through various avenues, including increasing staff training as well as utilizing an advisory board of outside experts. This situation does showcase the important role consumers play in policing these brands. After Kennedy took to Instagram on the same day the hoodie was on the runway, outrage quickly spread, and the piece was removed from the line before it ever hit stores. High end designer brands like Burberry have committed followers and count on their customers overlooking their lack of judgement in situations like this. All too often, these issues blow over without proper amends; thus, we as consumers must hold brands accountable.
