Is Fashion Trash? Yes.

The most wonderful thing about the internet is that before things are in fashion, they are a viral trend already. Case in point: The just concluded Milan Fashion Week, where a young Swedish fashion label called Avavav has stolen the spotlight from houses such as Armani, Jil Sander, Missoni, Bottega Veneta, and even Dolce & Gabbana. How did they do it? Cleverly, of course. By making the show less about the collection, and more about virality.

- NAMRATA ZAKARIA

Avavav, under creative director Beate Karlsson, made a great point about fashion ending up in trash cans by having actual trash thrown at the models on the runway. Even as the girls came out for their final walk, show runners from the audience began flinging food waste, plastic bottles and packaged item wrappers at the models. One of the models even tripped and fell, thanks to the amount of waste collected on the runway, leading to a little criticism on the safety of runway models. But also, would you like actual garbage thrown at you even though you were paid for the act? Nope, I don’t think so.

Avavav’s reasoning was personal, its previous collection was called “trash” by online trolls. And it took the hate it received a little too far. I am not sure if this sort of gimmick will take a brand far, more so since this is the venerated Milan Fashion Week, the biggest of all fashion weeks anywhere in the world.