On March 2, the cancellation of Rakuten Fashion Week Tokyo for the 2020 Autumn/Winter season was confirmed, finally drawing to a close all the speculation about its planned mid-March shows during the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic.
Why so late to cancel? The fashion system is always thinking one season ahead. March¡¯s fashion week offerings, for example, would be for sale from September, to be worn by the well-dressed through to early 2021. Though the collections are shown to the industry in March, they would have been put into sample production at least a month in advance, and before that they would have been designed, mulled over, and gone through a trend consultation process.
Slamming on the brakes to fashion week after all that spells financial disaster for many and, given the output is seasonal, it can¡¯t just be knocked back a couple of months.
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