When Fashion Borrows Without Asking: A Conversation About Cultural Appropriation

Most of us have never thought about where a pattern comes from. We see it, we like it, we buy it. That moment of ease is exactly where the problem begins.

Imagine you spent years learning to do something beautiful. Something your mother taught you, and her mother taught her, and someone taught her long before that. You do it with care. You do it with meaning. And then one day, someone takes that thing, copies it, sells it, profits from it, and never once says your name.

This is not a hypothetical. This is the everyday reality of millions of artisans across India and the world. And it is exactly what cultural appropriation looks like when it moves through the fashion industry.

What Does Cultural Appropriation Actually Mean?

Cultural appropriation is when elements of one culture are adopted by members of another (usually more dominant) culture without acknowledgement, understanding, or even respect for their origin.

In fashion, this plays out constantly. 

• A bindi worn as a festival accessory
• A Native American headdress as a Halloween costume
• Block-printed fabric lifted from Rajasthani craft traditions and mass-produced somewhere with no connection to that heritage whatsoever

It helps to be clear about what cultural appropriation is not, because this conversation can easily go too far in the other direction.

Buying and wearing a piece made by an artisan from another culture, especially when you've paid a fair price and taken the time to understand its story, is closer to appreciation than appropriation. 

Admiring and celebrating other cultures is not the problem. The problem is when a culture's work is taken, copied, and profited from without credit, consent, or compensation, effectively erasing the people behind it.

When a design is stripped of its context, the makers behind it are stripped of their credit and often their livelihood too.

The Line Between Appreciation and Appropriation

It is not always a clean line. But there are questions worth sitting with before you buy, wear, or celebrate something from a culture that is not your own.

Is the source community credited? A sari-inspired silhouette on a global runway means something very different when the designer names the weavers, the region, and the tradition. 

Silence is a red flag.

Is the community benefiting? If a traditional craft technique becomes the star of a brand's collection, but the artisans who created that technique see nothing in return, that is extraction, not exchange.

Is the cultural meaning respected? Some symbols are sacred. The Om, the Hamsa, the bindi…these are not decorative motifs. When they are printed on swimwear or merchandise, they are not being celebrated. They are being flattened.

Who holds the power in this exchange? 

Appropriation tends to move in one direction. It flows from communities with less social and economic power toward those with more. A mainstream brand profits from what a marginalised community created, while that community stays marginalised.

Real World Instances That Made the World Pay Attention

These are not isolated incidents. They are patterns.

Zara and the Mixtec community 

Mexico's Ministry of Culture sent a letter to Zara asking the brand to publicly explain itself after the company released a blue embroidered midi dress that looked very similar to the sacred huipil dresses made by the Mixtec community of San Juan Colorado, Oaxaca. 

The original dresses take local craftswomen at least a month to make and are deeply tied to the community's history and worldview. 

Zara's parent company denied any intentional borrowing. The dress was quietly removed from their website. The artisans received nothing.

Isabel Marant and the Mixe blouse 

French designer Isabel Marant featured a blouse in her Spring 2015 collection. It looked almost exactly like a traditional blouse worn by the Mixe people of Oaxaca for over 600 years. The indigenous community from Tlahuitoltepec spoke out publicly, demanded reparations, and also took their case to a press conference.

The original blouse cost around 300 pesos in their village. Marant's version sold for the equivalent of 4,500 pesos on luxury platforms. The case ended with Oaxaca's congress formally declaring the design as cultural heritage. Marant's company did not compensate the community.

Victoria's Secret and the Native American headdress

At their annual fashion show, model Karlie Kloss walked the runway in a full-length feathered war bonnet paired with lingerie. 

A war bonnet is not a costume or decoration. In many Indigenous cultures, it is a sacred item that a person must earn through acts of bravery. Only respected leaders are allowed to wear one.

Native American groups immediately condemned the move. They called it disrespectful and harmful to Native women, who already face widespread sexualisation.

The Bindi at Coachella

Since 2014, the bindi has become a popular festival accessory at Coachella and similar events, worn by celebrities like Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens, and the Jenner sisters. 

For Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist communities, the bindi is a sacred symbol representing the third eye and spiritual connection. 

The Reclaim the Bindi movement was born out of this frustration. South Asian women pointed out a painful double standard. The same bindi that gets them mocked or stereotyped becomes a cool accessory when a pop star wears it on stage. 

There has been no real resolution. The debate plays out again every festival season.

Prada and the Kolhapuri Chappal 

In June 2025, Prada showed sandals at Milan Fashion Week that looked almost identical to the Kolhapuri chappal. The latter is a handcrafted leather sandal with roots going back to 12th-century Maharashtra.

The brand described them simply as "leather flat sandals" with no mention of their Indian origin.

A genuine Kolhapuri chappal sells for as little as ₹1,000. Prada's version was priced at over ₹1,00,000. The gap says everything.

After a wave of outrage from Indian artisans, politicians, and consumers, Prada acknowledged the inspiration and entered talks with artisan communities. The case is still unfolding, but it has already become the most high-profile example of Indian craft being taken and sold without credit in recent memory.

Each of these cases tells the same story. When the aesthetics travel without the people, something important is lost.

A More Honest Way to Engage

None of this means fashion cannot draw from diverse cultural traditions. It means the engagement needs to be more honest and more generous.

It looks like naming the craftsperson alongside the craft. It means building real partnerships with artisan communities rather than just extracting from them, and pricing that works in a way that actually reflects the skill and time behind it.

When you know who made something, what it means, and why it matters, wearing it becomes something closer to witnessing. That changes the relationship entirely.

The Choice Is Yours

Artisan communities around the globe are resilient and deeply rooted in their craft. But they are working within an unequal marketplace. 

What they need is an audience that can tell the difference between their work and its imitation, and choose accordingly.

Cultural appropriation is not only about offense but also about economics. It is about  whether we build an industry that sustains the makers at its foundation, or one that only borrows their beauty.

The choice starts with what you decide to buy, and why.

At TuDuGu, every product carries a story that begins with the person who made it. Because fashion should never forget where it comes from.