Mathew Williamson, who according to this article is a “clothing designer to the stars”, recently unveiled a collection of dresses that includes two outfits based on traditional Ethiopian design. This caught the attention of the Ethiopian government, who has expressed a desire to keep Mr. Williamson’s hands off their cultural heritage. Ethiopia has claimed that the designer violated their intellectual property rights, and indeed, a representative from the Intellectual Property Office in Addis Ababa said for the article, “These are the dresses of our mothers and grandmothers. They symbolise our identity, faith and national pride. Nobody has the right to claim these designs as their own.” There is also a groundswell in Ethiopia regarding the actions of Williamson, and the article cites a Facebook group dedicated expresses outrage over the incident. Many Ethiopians suggest that Williamson donate some or all of his profits to Ethiopia and its dress-makers, and others suggest that he ought to use those of African descent or current citizenship to model these dresses. The Ethiopian government may be looking to get the support of Oxfam, a humanitarian organization that backed Ethiopia when it sued Starbucks for the right to trademark its coffee beans.
I feel like I must be missing something here: Why is a designer not allowed to appropriate symbols of national unity for the purposes of fashion? Look! The dresses Williamson designed are not nearly as symbolic as a flag, and while I realize that certain types of dress have extremely specific connotations, the simple fact that those dress are “the dresses of our mothers and grandmothers” means that Ethiopia could not possibly have any legal claim to those designs. Unless the exact specifications of Williamson’s dresses fit the exact specifications of every Ethiopian woman’s dress, which, considering the somewhat revealing nature of the dress and the bright blue shoe accessory, I doubt they do, Ethiopia does not seem to have much a claim to designs which a spokesperson for Williamson said draw on both Ethiopian and Pan-African themes. While I understand the desire to trademark an export like coffee beans, claims on popular clothing designs are not as tenable or, in my opinion, reasonable. It might sound cynical, but after the suggestion that some of the profits go to charity, it seems that this dispute might be a ploy to raise money. That money is especially necessary now, as the Ethiopia-Eritrea border conflict grows ever more dire. Assuming there is some motivation behind this dispute with designer besides the offended honor of the Ethiopian people, this story highlights the need for funds in Ethiopia, which, besides its conflict with Eritrea, is taking in Eritrean refugees and stationing troops in Somalia for the foreseeable future.
