An atelier in the bylanes of Paris. Photo by Kavita Parmar

In the contortions and developments following the economic recession of 1973, the project of hyper-financialization won the hearts and pockets of the ascendant governments in the US and UK. Resulting from this was a sea-change in corporate perspectives across the western world: where the most encouraged course of action for companies was no longer self investment or material expansion for the sake of generating larger profits, but rather a rapid and massive consolidation of barely related financial assets for the increase of the enterprise’s perceived market value.

In the field of groceries, supermarkets across Europe and Australia on paper became logisticians, wholesalers, producers, manufacturers, and even insurance or credit card providers. As the market became more and more consolidated from this the lower and lower prices afforded by these internationally strung, consolidated, sometimes exploitative supply chains became the norm. With the higher price tags of independent industry becoming comparatively unaffordable.

Fashion retail was for a time uncharacteristically slow to this trend. The market remained fragmented and large players, though titans of industry in their own right, did not control enough of the points of sale to constitute an oligopoly. However over the course of the last few decades independent retailers have suffered the very same slow and agonising death.

Within the last two years specifically, from a dual pressure of the continued rise in e-commerce and a massive consolidation in physical retail by conglomerates, independent retail stores have dwindled year-on-year. Despite this, the market has never been wealthier.

These shifts in retail were not the spontaneous choice of some executive, nor do they represent a democratic desire of the public to organise fashion along the lines which it takes today. As the material base for the old fashion industry had its footing swept from under it with globalisation, incentive structures were created that promoted systems of massive supply chains which, coincidentally, were much more difficult for small projects to compete in: In other words, there was no intentional malice to it; the industry simply adjusted itself to the economic conditions of the time.

While that may have sounded fatalistic said in the 2000s. In the second half of the 2020s we are in the midst of a definite break in the way that things are done.

The climate crisis is no longer a topic spoken only in Ted Talks, domestic production is viewed as increasingly necessary to combat unemployment, and the illusion of an unbreakable supply of cheap foreign resources from impoverished countries has been shattered. Across the world, people shuffle to reorganise themselves fast. And as the 70s took with it the fashion retail system of old Europe, so too will the 20s signal the first steps towards a new era. For good or ill.

XTANT will always prefer optimism when it comes to these things. Incredibly large strides for the better have already been taken over the past few decades. But, in order to see any kind of positive change, we cannot sit idle and just hope things go our way. It is crucial, even more so than pushing out the old system, to create examples and structures that could serve as alternatives to the existing order. 

XTANT’s market, and our interest in the world of retail is held in part because we need the money to keep the broader XTANT project running. That’s not something we have any illusions over. But on the other hand, we have no interest in being the only project of our type. 

The most ambitious goal buried deep within all of our hearts is a far off future of ten thousand XTANT’s. Some permanent installations, some temporary, focused solely on local producers or on collaborations of distant artisans, going by ten thousand different names in ten thousand different corners of the world.

Places where artisans, workshops, or brands can find their footing as they start, where they see the people they share floorspace as brothers and sisters in arms rather than competitors, and where the retail stores become places of beauty people look forward to going to, as if they were expositions unto themselves.

See you all in Mallorca soon.