IP for Creatives: How to Protect your Work from Copycats

Earlier this month, I spoke at Graduate Fashion Week to for the 'IP for Creatives: How to Protect your Work from Copycats' panel talk. Intellectual Property within Fashion can bring about various complexities which fall into grey areas and therefore it's understandable how its legal importance can be overlooked by many in the fashion industry. Key things to remember: - See your brand/business as a serious commodity and be prepared to invest in protecting it. - Before you go about investing in the legal protection of your brand/business, think about where you see your brand/business in the next 5-10 years as this will reflect in the type of protection you go for as they all carry differing lengths of protection and renewals. - Don't hold back from creating and putting yourself/work out there! You're an entrepreneur/business owner first and whilst there is the risk of your work being copied, this shouldn't deter you from still creating! Many thanks to Giovanna Vieira for organising such a wonderful talk which presented so many important insights and topics that need to be widely discussed for the advancement of our future and current talented fashion creatives! Picture Credits: Simran Kaur, Ellis T Carroll, Gabrielle Thomas