TED Talks on almost any subject can be found. They can be very informative and inspiring. While quartine, I spend a lot of time watching TED Talks, to learn more about the “in and outs” of the fashion industry. The fashion industry is very complex and there can be so much to learn about it, so I found that TED Talks help a lot.
Here are 12 of my favorite TED Talks about the fashion industry:
What started as designer Danit Peleg’s fashion school project turned into a collection of 3D-printed designs that have the strength and flexibility for everyday wear. “Fashion is a very physical thing,” she says. “I wonder what our world will look like when our clothes will be digital.” -TED Talk
What happens to the clothes we don’t buy? You might think that last season’s coats, trousers and turtlenecks end up being put to use, but most of it (nearly 13 million tons each year in the United States alone) ends up in landfills. Fashion has a waste problem, and Amit Kalra wants to fix it. He shares some creative ways the industry can evolve to be more conscientious about the environment — and gain a competitive advantage at the same time. -TED Talk
Designer Suzanne Lee shares her experiments in growing a kombucha-based material that can be used like fabric or vegetable leather to make clothing. The process is fascinating, the results are beautiful (though there’s still one minor drawback …) and the potential is simply stunning. -TED Talk
Fashion and creativity go hand in hand.Fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi spins through a dizzying array of inspirations — from ’50s pinups to a fleeting glimpse of a woman on the street who makes him shout “Stop the cab!” Inside this rambling talk are real clues to living a happy, creative life. -TED Talk
Josh Luber is a “sneakerhead,” a collector of rare or limited sneakers. With their insatiable appetite for exclusive sneakers, these tastemakers drive marketing and create hype for the brands they love, specifically Nike, which absolutely dominates the multi-billion dollar secondary market for sneakers. Luber’s company, Campless, collects data about this market and analyzes it for collectors and investors. In this talk, he takes us on a journey into this complicated, unregulated market and imagines how it could be a model for a stock market for commerce. -TED Talk
Australians call them “runners.” The British know them as “trainers.” Americans refer to them as “sneakers.” Whatever you call them, these casual shoes are worn by billions of people around the world. Today, roughly 23 billion shoes are produced each year. So, how can we balance our love of sneakers with the need for sustainability? Angel Chang explores how shoe manufacturing impacts our planet. -TED Talk
Do you ever order clothes online in different sizes and colors, just to try them on and then send back what doesn’t work? Aparna Mehta used to do this all time, until she one day asked herself: Where do all these returned clothes go? In an eye-opening talk, she reveals the unseen world of “free” online returns which, instead of ending up back on the shelf, are sent to landfills by the billions of pounds each year and shares a plan to help put an end to this growing environmental catastrophe. – TED Talk
How the simple button changed the world, according to fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi. – TED Talk
The hoodie is a lot more than just a comfy sweatshirt. Design curator Paola Antonelli takes us through its history. – TED Talk
Apparently, popularity can be predicted and companies are buying it. Increasingly, fashion brands are relying on trend forecasting agencies in order to create the “next big thing.” However, fashion buyer Mahir Can Işik says these predictions are putting creativity at the risk of irrelevance. (Currently, more than 12,000 brands get their predictions from the same agency.) Işik calls for a renaissance of self-expression and individuality in order to break free from the sterile suggestions of forecasters. -TED Talk
Fashion designers have the power to change culture — and Becca McCharen-Tran is using her platform to expand the industry’s narrow definition of beauty. Sharing highlights of her work, McCharen-Tran discusses the inspiration behind her norm-shattering designs and shows how she’s celebrating beauty in all forms. “I want the consumer to know that it’s not your body that needs to change — it’s the clothes,” she says. -TED Talk
Natsai Audrey Chieza is a designer on a mission to reduce pollution in the fashion industry while creating amazing new things to wear. In her lab, she noticed that the bacteria Streptomyces coelicolor makes a striking red-purple pigment, and now she’s using it to develop bold, color-fast fabric dye that cuts down on water waste and chemical runoff, compared with traditional dyes. And she isn’t alone in using synthetic biology to redefine our material future; think “leather” made from mushrooms and superstrong yarn made from spider-silk protein. We’re not going to build the future with fossil fuels, Chieza says. We’re going to build it with biology. -TED Talk