August was an important month in the fashion scenery, marking the 2024 Copenhagen Fashion Week – one of the main events in the fashion calendar, alongside Paris Fashion Week and New York Fashion Week. Besides runways and new trends to follow during the season, Copenhagen’s event has a different mission than others: sustainability. Although Denmark’s fashion event is not considered one of the top 4 fashion weeks, Copenhagen’s has slowly made it to the media’s interest.
However, far more than fashion, Copenhagen Fashion Week is, in a way, one of the main initiatives in fashion to give sustainability a space.
The History of Copenhagen Fashion Week
Copenhagen Fashion Week was created in 2006 – one year after Estocolm’s. Although both European, these two fashion events differentiated themselves: while Switzerland’s fashion focused on minimalism and precision, Denmark’s followed a bohemian energy. However, its fashion choices weren’t the only point of differentiation, it was also their ethos.
Copenhagen Fashion Week is ruled by the Law of Jante, a code created by author Aksel Sandemose in 1993, which highly discouraged competitive exhibitionism and subverting hierarchies in the name of collaboration – opposed to anything shown in the main four fashion events, although recently there has been a bigger appeal for them give space to sustainability.
2018 was the key point for Copenhagen Fashion Week’s big success, running up to the other events. In that year, Cecilie Thorsmark took charge of the event, leading to sustainability becoming the event’s top priority. Thorsmark implemented a holistic approach: participating brands in the lineup must follow at least 18 strict standards that cover areas such as diversity, supply chain and the useful life of clothing items.
The fashion event is also ruled by a strict conduct code, divided in six parts: design, strategic direction, choice of materials, working conditions, consumer engagement and fashion show.
Copenhagen’s Fashion Week impact on sustainability
Since its creation, Copenhagen Fashion Week has been a main pillar for sustainability and diversity discussions in the fashion scene. When talking about its impact on sustainability, it’s honorable to mention the “Reintenting Copenhagen Fashion Week”, launched in 2020, which intended to ban all consumption of single-use plastic during the event.
In 2021, mandatory environmental regulations were established for brands participating in Fashion Week – now, there are 19 rules that must be followed.
The standards establish rules ranging from the materials used in clothing, their quality, durability, and the ability to be repaired and reused. Brands must also have an inclusive size grid, they must not use plastic packaging and even the working conditions offered by the labels are subject to event scrutiny. The use of fur, feathers, and exotic leathers is also not permitted.
The AW23 edition of CPHFW that took place in January/February 2023 was the first to require brands on the official show schedule to live up to the Minimum Standards and undergo an external screening of their survey responses. In that year, two of the brands did not live up to the standards and were not allowed to showcase their show, according to the 2023 Copenhagen Fashion Week relative.
Therefore, Copenhagen Fashion Week is one of the main events (and, perhaps, the only one) to give space to discussions of sustainability in fashion – a scene known to be damaging to the Earth and an extreme polluter. The Fall/Winter 2023 season marked the first time that the requirements have been fully implemented. The event is also a way of making high fashion brands (and consumers) accountable for their pollution footprint and their over consumerism.
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The article above was edited by Gabriela Travizzanutto.
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