An Ironic Guide to Duping Ethically
My dupe morality pyramid.
The day I Googled the ALAÏA ballet flats and saw a dupe section in the search bar is the day I knew dupe culture had officially become normalized. Here was the world’s biggest search engine endorsing this once controversial habit and deciding—if only for a brief period (they have since removed the section)—to capitalize on it.
A Brief History of Dupes
Dupes have existed for as long as society began assigning value to clothes. In the 19th century, fashion was largely the domain of the elite as they possessed the means and access to fabrics and couturiers capable of conferring sartorial distinction on them. The everyday man, unable to afford this luxury, used their local tailors to reproduce the fashion of the bourgeoisie in their quest for respectability and upward mobility. The practice was so established, magazines circulated fashion plates showcasing the latest aristocratic styles to inform the masses.
Mass manufacturing enabled companies (and consumers) to dupe on a macro scale. After World War II, American designers traveled to Europe to acquire, sketch or browse designs they planned to duplicate and sell at lower prices. Department chains hired in-house designers for the purpose of recreating whatever came down the Paris runways. But copying, “a fancy name for stealing” as the late fashion designer Elizabeth Hawes once said, wasn’t only the purview of the American fashion industry. As she recounts in her seminal book Fashion is Spinach, the practice was also popular in Europe, although not openly acknowledged. In fact, when Hawes moved to Paris in 1938, her first job was at a copy house, an illegitimate dressmaking establishment that went to great lengths to infiltrate fashion shows and retail stores in order to learn about the latest trends and acquire original pieces.
Dupes are nothing new, although the copies of the past were made with better care. Thanks to the digital revolution, cheaply produced replicas are proliferating (and being consumed) at record speed. Roughly 31% of U.S. adults report having intentionally purchased a dupe of a premium or luxury product, according to Morning Consult. Meanwhile, Reddit reports a 50% rise in the creation of dupe communities (i.e. r/fashionreps, r/reptime, r/replika, and r/designerreps) from 2022 to 2023. “Any time a rise in demand for luxury goods coincides with economic turmoil, we see a rise [in demand for] replicas,” Rob Gaige, Reddit’s head of global insights told the Drum.
The Ethics of Duping
The widespread adoption of dupes runs counter to sustainable consumption but as I shared in my previous post, some conscious shoppers are pushing themselves to dupe ethically. “I feel better buying a so-called ‘dupe’ from a DTC brand for a few reasons,” my friend Krista Jones told me. “I trust these are better quality and I like not contributing to disposable fast fashion.”
Duping can ironically bring up a set of moral questions: Am I supporting fast fashion? Can I find it on a resale site? Does a POC-owned brand make this? What is the least toxic company I can dupe from? What these considerations make clear is that there are social and environmental consequences to mindless consumption. The effect of enabling fast fashion in the process of duping is wildly different from that of powering the circular economy or funding small underprivileged labels. One maintains the status quo while the other amplifies positive change. The popular mantra that there is no ethical consumption under capitalism is misguided as it not only discourages discernment but it also inadvertently condones systems of exploitation tied to garment production.
Saying the silent part out loud: ethical duping is possible.
The Dupe Morality Pyramid