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Relational records: exploring historical prosperity fashion within business history

Relational records: exploring historical prosperity fashion within business history
Relational records: exploring historical prosperity fashion within business history
The profit-centric mentality within much of the global fashion industry causes great harm to societies, environments, and international economies. This focus has come under stark criticism from academia, industry, and consumers who call for broader, more inclusive definitions of success. These should consider people, places, interconnections, and relationships, alongside financial gain. This paper explores how our engagement with fashion’s future can be expanded by looking into its past. This backwards gaze employing a ‘sustainable prosperity’ approach can provide both context and examples for current and future industry application. Focusing on fashion businesses established prior to the rise of fast fashion, we indicate the value of non-traditional sources and viewing business success from a more holistic perspective. We ask how ‘prosperity’ might be defined for a more diverse range of fashion firms. Utilising examples from the 19th and 20th centuries, we suggest that the boundaries of business history of fashion methodologies and sources should be extended. These should account for social, environmental, and collective as well as economic and technological success. If we wish fashion to extend the concept of prosperity, this approach should also be applied within historical contexts as well.
Collectivity, Business History, Methodologies, Education, Prosperity, Fashion
2975-0466
62-71
Janssens, Alice
8ece8ce6-8b01-49c5-bd59-b03777ced762
Tregenza, Liz
5afb5f82-dcf7-464e-a0dd-4c8985d4148b
Janssens, Alice
8ece8ce6-8b01-49c5-bd59-b03777ced762
Tregenza, Liz
5afb5f82-dcf7-464e-a0dd-4c8985d4148b

Janssens, Alice and Tregenza, Liz (2025) Relational records: exploring historical prosperity fashion within business history. Fashion Highlight Journal, SI (1), 62-71. (doi:10.36253/fh-3121).

Record type: Special issue

Abstract

The profit-centric mentality within much of the global fashion industry causes great harm to societies, environments, and international economies. This focus has come under stark criticism from academia, industry, and consumers who call for broader, more inclusive definitions of success. These should consider people, places, interconnections, and relationships, alongside financial gain. This paper explores how our engagement with fashion’s future can be expanded by looking into its past. This backwards gaze employing a ‘sustainable prosperity’ approach can provide both context and examples for current and future industry application. Focusing on fashion businesses established prior to the rise of fast fashion, we indicate the value of non-traditional sources and viewing business success from a more holistic perspective. We ask how ‘prosperity’ might be defined for a more diverse range of fashion firms. Utilising examples from the 19th and 20th centuries, we suggest that the boundaries of business history of fashion methodologies and sources should be extended. These should account for social, environmental, and collective as well as economic and technological success. If we wish fashion to extend the concept of prosperity, this approach should also be applied within historical contexts as well.

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More information

Published date: 14 July 2025
Venue - Dates: Prosperity Fashion: Fashion Highlight Journal and Firenze University Press, Università degli Studi di Firenze, Florence, Italy, 2025-02-13 - 2025-02-14
Keywords: Collectivity, Business History, Methodologies, Education, Prosperity, Fashion

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 504449
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/504449
ISSN: 2975-0466
PURE UUID: 375700ea-a9b7-4c38-bf4b-2d18dc45e70d
ORCID for Alice Janssens: ORCID iD orcid.org/0009-0009-3851-174X

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 09 Sep 2025 18:43
Last modified: 11 Sep 2025 03:37

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Contributors

Author: Alice Janssens ORCID iD
Author: Liz Tregenza

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