How People with Disabilities Experience Clothing
The apparel industry is a powerful economic driver that influences employment, promotes sustainability standards, and both fosters and enables personal expression and creativity. In modern society, “clothing” is considered a necessity, while” fashion” reflects currently trending styles. People with disabilities often face challenges in meeting their personal needs and desires, and finding clothing that is fashionable, on trend, and accessible, and affordable can often be an unattainable goal. As the apparel industry has become more aware and responsive, it has begun developing adaptive apparel to better serve this growing demographic. Although adaptive clothing still faces many challenges and obstacles related to visibility, acceptance, and production, it continues to gain momentum with each fashion season, as awareness and exposure increase among designers, producers, and marketers – and among consumers themselves as well.
Adaptive Clothing: A Few Key Challenges
Retail Price
Adaptivewear has a higher price tag, with a consumer market that often has fewer disposable funds.. In most cases, adaptive fashions are not covered by insurance and the inequities in the adaptive clothing market can have significant social and economic consequences for individuals with disabilities, limiting their ability to participate fully in social and economic life.
Accessibility
Adaptivewear is primarily available on-line, and not in stores, possibly due to the lower numbers of potential consumers as well as limited display space, necessary aisle and dressing room policies, and other accessibility issues. This deprives people with disabilities of the traditional shopping for clothing experiences – of actually seeing and touching garments, examining textures, trying specific items on, observing fit and appearance, and considering color and style. In addition, the fashion industry’s lack of collaboration with individuals with disabilities themselves in the adaptivewear design process can lead to inaccurate assumptions about their needs and desires.
Education
Although adaptivewear is a formally recognized category of clothing, it is not given much attention in fashion education programs. Adaptive clothing is often presented as a separate category and is not integrated into mainstream fashion assignments and educational collections. This can lead to a sense of separation that limits the visibility of adaptive clothing as a design and production opportunity for students.
Language
Some fashion brands have had content blocked on social media for promoting adaptivewear. The term “adaptive” itself can be viewed as stigmatizing and exclusive, particularly within the fashion industry, and a shift towards more inclusive language and messaging is needed. Many features of adaptive clothing (zippers and closures and sizes and shapes) can also be a valuable option for all consumers, but many consumers may hesitant when the clothing is described in terminology focused primarily on disability. People with special needs themselves may be hesitant to explore clothing labeled as adaptivewear out of a concern with their own self-image.
Choice
People with disabilities do not have the same options in fashion choices as the rest of the population. Along with the more limited choices of clothing fashions generally available for people with disabilities, certain disabilities may encounter even more limited, or totally absent, choices, potentially leaving some people feeling even more marginalized. Lack of any meaningful choices can also negatively affect self-image in many ways.
Production Costing
Fashion brands have higher production costs for adaptivewear. Adaptive clothing often involves more complex production processes, requiring specialized materials and designs, and potential markets are relatively smaller. Each of these factors increases production costs, and businesses that would like to include adaptive designs find profitability to be a realistic challenge. Some or all these higher costs may be passed on to the consumer, creating barriers for individuals with disabilities, whose disposable income is often more limited.
Universal Design
Universal Design principles, used in a wide variety of settings, such as homes, public areas, transportation, and furniture design, is also an important element in the consideration of adaptive clothing. While some adaptive clothing designers and manufacturers incorporate elements of Universal Design, many mainstream producers still lack an understanding of Universal Design principles and are not willing to adopt these in their collections. In addition, there is the misconception that Universal Design can address all the clothing needs for people with disabilities. Some specific elements of adaptive clothing, designed to accommodate specific impairments, cannot necessarily be addressed utilizing Universal Design principles. However, the concept of Universal Design, with its focus on inclusivity, is a positive element in the consideration of clothing for people with disabilities.
Learn More About Adaptive Clothing
Adaptive Fashion promotes a consideration of inclusiveness and special needs, as well as individual desires for self-expression to both examine and meet the need for change in the way that the apparel industry considers the disability consumer market.
The ideas considered, and the experiences of the author and contributors encourage enabling individuals with disabilities to have choices in styles and fits that are essential to each person’s daily interaction with their wider world. Adaptive fashion can enhance the lives and activities of people with disabilities, enabling them to more fully and comfortably participate in the world around them.
Adaptive Fashion: How People with Disabilities Experience Clothing explores experiences that people with disabilities and their caregivers face related to clothing, style, and the dressing process, while highlighting the pioneers in the apparel industry who have created an adaptive space for problem-solving in fashion design. While industry is equipped with the technology to produce adaptive clothing, and society recognizes the rights and needs of people with disabilities as equal consumers, a paradigm shift is needed to change perception and increase awareness in this area. The challenge presented here asks one of the largest industries in the world to set an example, and to create standards, so that adaptive fashion can become as widely accepted and expected as other ADA requirements, such as accessible parking, closed captioning in theaters, and accessible seating in restaurants.
Adaptive Fashion is ideal reading for students studying fashion, disability, diversity, history, business, marketing, sociology, and technology.
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HEADER IMAGE CREDIT: Chamiah Dewey, designer and founder of Dewey Clothing, London. The photo was from this collaboration with Selfridges. Used with permission.
