Bihor Couture

Objectives

Fashion big names have a history of cultural appropriation, without giving credit. It was time to stop that.

They looked back at other recent examples of cultural appropriation in fashion: Stella McCartney used traditional African motives in her Summer/Spring 2018 collection. Louis Vuitton debuted a line of blankets, worn as coats by the people of Besotho, as part of their menswear collection, and many more.

They created Bihor Couture, the first fashion line that fights against cultural appropriation.
It aims to return money to the local communities by selling authentic fashion pieces on an online platform.

Bihor Couture is not only a brand that sells authentic clothes from Bihor. It serves as a model created to return money to the local communities, so everybody can enjoy these traditions for generations to come. The model serves as an inspiration for other cultures that face the same problem.

Strategy & solution

To return back the deserved money to the communities, they first launched an online platform, an e-shop with the authentic fashion pieces created by Bihor local craftsmen. They launched the new brand with a content series, featuring the original designers from Bihor, commenting on Dior’s collection, the same one where the jacket from Bihor was included.

The series was highly entertaining, with juicy comments from their local creators, and it could be watched on Facebook and YouTube.
The campaign was a mix of digital videos, prints with their designers, and videos that targeted international celebrities interested in Dior, like Lady Gaga or Beyonce with customized messages from their local creators.

They launched a video invitation to Dior to come and design a jacket with the local creators.
Their designers hijacked even Paris Fashion Week, wearing the original jacket from Bihor, thus making a statement to the entire world of fashion.

Results

The campaign made a huge impact, with people storming the website and placing hundreds of orders for traditional clothes. Presently, more craftsmen are being brought into the platform, to work on all the orders that keep on coming.

Pre-orders were made to cover the work for the next 4,5 years.

Beau Monde also raised money to fund the only craftsmen school in Bihor, to attract more young people that can learn the craft and it further in the future.

So the tradition lives on.