Copycats & Counterfeits

Copycats. Idea stealers. Unoriginal people. Try-hards. Thoughtless degenerates. Okay, maybe I went too far. Maybe not.

They are everywhere. Spreading like the plague – online, in print, editorials, designs and don’t forget, the ‘bitch, stole my look”. Ultimately, these incidents can be unplanned on the red carpet but copycats in the fashion world steer far beyond the wardrobe doubles and petty style stealing.

Steve Madden shoe designer hails King of the Copycats. Not a title he should hope for. Madden has been ripping off high end brands by reproducing their shoes and not even trying to be vague. Clearly, he relishes in the ability to counterfeit footwear designs and doesn’t mind taking the credit for them either. But in reality, who does he really think he’s fooling? Christian Louboutin? You know Steve Madden copied them. Prada? You know he copied those too. What do Alexander McQueen, Givenchy and Balenciaga all have in common? You bet. Them too. It’s pretty surprising that McQueen and Balenciaga are the only houses to actually sue this idiot. I know you all have at least one pair of Steve Maddens!! I do not. Never will. Don’t continue to support this brand.

Knock-offs. You’ve been living under a rock – hopefully it was shiny and pretty- if you’ve never heard of a knock-off. Knock-offs are on a larger, global scale. Thousands of KO’s or counterfeit goods enter Canada on a daily basis, with no capacity to intercept them all. I recently learned that if anything is a popular item, somewhere it’s being replicated. I’ll give you one guess just where that somewhere is…

Ding! Ding! China. 3/4 of all knock-offs come from China. Why am I not surprised.

Fact: Louis Vuitton was actually the first to establish branding and the issue of counterfeiting. The infamous LV was created to stop fakes from copying the designs of his luggage concepts.

Fact: Canada Goose has an entire global team to process and appeal fake websites that sell counterfeit CG coats as their are thousands of them.

Fast Fashion Copycats. Huge corporations can be unoriginal too. Some massive fast fashion retailers like Forever 21, Target and H&M have been accused of producing runway inspired products, that basically look exactly the same as what went down the runway. Proenza Schouler, DVF and Phillip Lim have each been annoyed and raised complaints. But, Anna Sui won a hefty settlement against Forever 21 for “stealing their intellectual property”. Translation: “Get your own ideas fuck heads”.

Why would you copy this. I am not sure which one is uglier.

Just be original. You’re way cooler that way.

x Courtney