By Sara Fabek Zovko
Why toe the line between affordable and ethical, when you have the option to choose both?
Though Rita Ora wearing Primark to The Fashion Awards earlier this month can clearly be linked to the collaboration with the brand earlier this year, the choice to sport a fast fashion brand at the prestigious fashion award ceremony brings forth a lot of questions about whether the choice was bold, or simply profit orientated and tone deaf.
Like most red carpet events and award ceremonies, celebrities in attendance tend to be sporting looks luxury fashion brands or custom outfits by the top fashion Maisons in the industry, The Fashion Awards were no different. From Anne Hathaway in vintage Valentino to Sam Smith in a Vivienne Westwood ensemble, the audience of The Fashion Awards seemed to stick to this unspoken rule.
Rita Ora’s choice of wearing a widely accessible brand such as Primark to the TFA's was definitely a bold one, as she openly defied the concept of wearing high-end brands to such events. It has opened up a lot of room for conversations about celebrities using their platforms to spotlight fashion choices that are accessible to a much wider public than the usual outfits seen in front of cameras. However, whilst this opens up a discussion regarding the socioeconomic instability we currently live in, as well as, arguably, the still omnipresent class divide, the choice to wear a fast fashion brand, whilst bold, was also somewhat questionable.
In the social media age we live in now, we are almost hyper aware of the negative aspects of fast fashion, from the environmental impact to the unethical practices through which it is made. While it is important to highlight accessible fashion at high publicity events, could Rita not have made the choice to aim the spotlight at an independent, ethical brand?
The UK is fortunate enough to be a hub for many unique independent fashion brands, some of which are better known and some of which are still branded as small businesses. In any case, they are far more likely to benefit from a celebrity endorsement on the red carpet, as well as also advocating for ethical and environmentally friendly manufacturing practices. Rita Ora may have chosen to subvert expectations of wearing a big brand name on the red carpet, but she also chose to promote a brand that is not only well-known, but almost notorious for its practices.