Fashion in denial - A critical fashion practice to gender equality

This thesis is a critical fashion practice, which aims to tackle the restrictions and oppression caused by the binary logic of gender in the contemporary fashion industry by offering a possible alternative sitting outside the binary system. The binary system of femininity and masculinity is established under the context of patriarchal hegemony. Thus clothing or fashion that constructs and reflects personal and gender identities with the binary mindset of gender perpetuates gender inequality in society. Similarly, gendered fashion or clothing fails to construct and express personal identities, inasmuch as personal identities in contemporary society are malleable and unable to be defined within two categories. This requires the alternatives of fashion and clothing transcending the binary logic of gender. The research of the thesis also elaborates that the gender border crossings in fashion function as reconfiguration and conformation rather than transcendence to the binary gendered fashion due to the evidence of the dominance of male principles observed in these attempts. In my opinion, a possible solution to this issue is to introduce the practice of genderless fashion which denies the visual signifiers of gender rather than mixing together signifiers from each category of the binary system of gender used in gender border crossings. The method for approaching the solution in this thesis is to distort the visual signifiers of gender on the selection of unisex wardrobe items through my critical design practice. The design process conducts the method of distortion in two sections – the garment construction and the textile design. The outcomes of this experiment in the field of genderless fashion are a fashion collection of 6 outfits containing 20 clothing items. This study provides my interpretation of genderless fashion as a future alternative for the fashion industry to contribute to gender equality