Fashion, Media, Promotion. The New Black Magic

In Fashion, Media, Promotion: the new black magic Fashion is linked to its communication networks – involving the reader in the process of selling Fashion in the global marketplace. Fashion's ingenuity in adapting to new means of promotion for digital and print media, websites, advertising, cinema, music and television, is celebrated. Hollywood's role in shaping Fashion's influence is assessed through Audrey Hepburn's persuasive iconography and the impact of the most watched movie of the 20th century: Gone with the Wind. Exceptional designers Coco Chanel, Christian Dior, Rei Kawakubo, Mary Quant, Elsa Schiaparelli, Vivienne Westwood are considered, together with extraordinary innovators Paul Smith, Vidal Sassoon, Lynne Franks. Roland Barthes' Fashion System and Mythologies are viewed as cultural and promotional texts, with revealing insights into the technologies which bring Fashion to mass audiences. Marketing and branding successes are reviewed and Fashion's continuing narrative is illustrated with luminous colour images.