• International Journal of Costume and Fashion
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.1-16
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• 2016

The purpose of this study was to explore fashion design and merchandising students' perception of creativity and the copyright protection of apparel design. A survey with open-ended questions was developed and distributed to a total of 100 fashion major students with specializations in apparel design and merchandising from three different universities located in a northwestern state of the United States. A majority of respondents showed their awareness that copying apparel design is ethically wrong and counterfeiting is legally wrong. They were able to distinguish between copying and interpreting and were aware that incorporating limited elements from inspirations was ethically acceptable. However, many of the students look for design inspiration from secondary sources, such as existing designers' works which they observe over the Internet, magazines, fashion shows, and store shopping, which may pose them to the temptation to copy such ideas. Although fashion copyright protection law has yet to become enacted, a majority of respondents support passage of fashion copyright protection law. The results give support to the needs for addressing the creative problem-solving processes and ethical decision-making jointly within apparel design and merchandising curriculum.

• The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.287-298
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• 2024

Clothing is intimately intertwined with daily lives as every individual relies on it. The pervasive issue of plagiarism in the fashion industry has led to an increased demand to protect intellectual property rights. Currently, studies on the protection of fashion design intellectual property rights in China remain in the exploratory stage and warrant further investigation. This paper addresses the issue in two parts. The first part contains an analysis of the theoretical foundation for the protection of fashion design copyrights. It is further divided into three subsections. The first subsection primarily examines the concept of copyrights and laws. The second subsection focuses on the concept of fashion design copyrights and laws. The third subsection analyzes copyright laws concerning fashion designs in China. The second section offers an analysis of infringement cases involving fashion designs published during the Baiyi Cup Intellectual Property Case Summary Writing Competition held in China in 2023. It outlines the shortcomings of the current Chinese copyright laws regarding the protection of fashion designs, and proposes measures for improvement. This study argues that the institutional framework for intellectual property rights in the Chinese fashion industry should align with practical considerations and explores suitable legal regulations and how they relate to specific circumstances in China. Besides refining the legal framework, fashion designers and enterprises must take measures to entablish the intellectual property rights of their clothing brands.