The Bread & Butter, the largest and most significant trade show in Berlin, has declared bankruptcy. Will this be the end of this legend, the end of an era? And if so, what will this mean for Berlins Fashion Week and Berlin as an international hub for fashion business?
The Bread & Butter trade show could be connected to a lot of things of the fashion industry that are in many ways unsustainable. A “You Only Live Once” philosophy. A Bigger Bolder Better attitude. The sky is the limit and on top of that limit there will be another party waiting for you. And the fair and its founder Karl-Heinz Müller were often said to be arrogant and megalomaniac. The extraordinary trade show was also the master of producing trash. And meanwhile, there are many fairs and shows in Berlin. So, who cares? The fair played its role for Berlin and its underlying paradigm of unlimited growth and consume is getting out of fashion..
But one thing made this fair different from all the others: a strong vision. It always wanted to be more then a trade show, it wanted to merge business with celebration, show with party. And with that, the Bread & Butter brought business to Berlin and helped the city to become an internationally renown fashion capital.
Probably the show was always a bit ahead of some of its exhibitors. If you read the interviews with Müller, he has been proclaiming a “choose quality, consume less” message for quite some years now, in example in 2009 he said to Exberliner: “I think a general trend is that people will consume less, with more awareness. They’ll look for authentic products. They will look for where it comes from, what it means, what history is behind it. A pair of really well-made jeans, for example, or really good leather shoes.”
Berlin is not only risking to loose its most relevant fashion trade show, and therewith also the significance of its fashion week, it is currently also risking to drain its creative identity. There is an increasing pressure on the cities creative scene. The answer should be a bold new vision on the cities creative future, and addressed with according actions and resources. A vision that nurtures bottom up innovations, supports its creative communities and local retail market, offers them gentrification-proof spaces to develop, and truly and thoroughly invest in sustainable solutions and initiatives in the city.
Now is the time to discuss what fashion business in Berlin should be about. According to me, that future should be about those three elements: innovation, creativity and sustainability. That mixture is what makes Berlin interesting and dynamic, and will also play an ever increasing role in the fashion business.
If there is not a vision, there will not be a future. As a protest against gentrification, friends of the streetartist BLU recently painted over his piece in Berlin Kreuzberg with black paint. Sometimes you need to paint something over to make space for new things. Catharsis. Let the new things be good and the visions bold.
And maybe, there will be a phoenix rising..
Photos: Bread & Butter Denim Religion Show; Blu street art piece painted over with black paint
Frans Prins 