From Stilista to Brand Communicator: Capital’s Refashioning of the Italian Fashion Industry in the 1990s

Session Chair: Cheryl S. McWatters, Editor, Accounting History Review and Father Edgar Thivierge Chair in Business History (University of Ottawa)

“From Stilista to Brand Communicator: Capital’s Refashioning of The Italian Fashion Industry in The 1990s”
Ignaz Cassar

“Accounting: The ‘art of Interessement’ and The ‘Good Spokesperson’: Innovation in Action in Luxury High-fashion (1960-1980)”
Massimo Sargiacomo (Università Gabriele d’Annuncio di Chieti-Pescara)

In the past decades, high fashion and luxury items have become – perhaps more than ever before – a common part of the lifestyle of consumers across the planet. Industry leaders have transformed into globally operating conglomerates to optimise their performance. This workshop seeks to examine and account for luxury as conceptualised and experienced over time. Beyond analyses of the contradictions and synergies of the present-day anachronism in global reach and local production, our interest lies in engaging with the historical narrative on luxury across time and space.

This workshop will discuss and debate two studies that investigate fashion and luxury from diverse theoretical and methodological perspectives, with the anticipation of a second workshop at a later date.