Photo Examples of How We Are Gendering Children’s Clothing

Following on from reading about Tal’s work I decided to go out into shops and find examples of how we are gendering children’s clothing through colour. I discovered that within shops young girls clothing is predominantly pink and boys are blue. In addition to looking at the colours used in retail for children’s clothing I have also been looking at how the products have been displayed.

 

The examples above are from Sainsbury’s

The examples above were taken in Primark

The examples above were taken in H&M

Window shot of Trespass camping shop

Artist Influences

I have been inspired by the work of Gili Tal whose work I read about in Frieze. She took a photo in the children’s section of H&M (see below). The children in the poster are magnified as they are on a large poster, with this and the clothes they are wearing Tal states that this ‘amplifies the feeling of them being dressed as adults, by adults. Or by their ideology’-https://frieze.com/article/portfolio-gili-tal (accessed: 29/9/2016)

 

Messages on Baby Grows Explained

I decided to sew on pink baby grows to play with the idea of pink being a ‘girls’ colour.

‘I Can Be Whoever I Want To Be’ and ‘Future Ceo’: Often baby clothing for girls feature slogans with the word ‘Princess’ on it. I feel that this is an unfair representation for young girls to grow up with the idea that they have to be ‘perfect’ and wait for a Prince to save them. My slogan ‘I Can Be Whoever I Want To Be’ battles against this idea that actually it is the child’s decision as to who they want to be. Additionally, ‘Future Ceo’ encourages children to aspire to more than just being a Princess.

‘I Only Date Girls’: This slogan plays on the idea of assuming that heterosexuality is the ‘norm’. Furthermore, just because the slogan is pink the grow could also be worn by a boy.

‘I am Handsome’: Reclaiming the term which is normally used to compliment a male.

 

Summer Project

I have become particularly interested in looking at gender and how as a society we project ideals on to our children to adhere with society. My experience working as a Visual Merchandiser and Customer Assistant in a Baby Shop has fuelled my interest in looking at how we gender children’s clothing and toys. I used a rail for this piece of work and had one side which was labelled as ‘Non Conformist to Society Collection’ with clothing I had created with aspirational messages on baby clothing which is not normally seen and the other side as the ‘Conformist to Society Collection’ where I exhibited examples of clothing I had found in shops. The clothing I had found in the shops included slogans such as ‘Ladies Man’, ‘Daddy’s Little Princess’ and ‘My Daddy Says I am Not Allowed to Date Ever’. The idea to exhibit the pieces of clothing together is to emphasise the contrast between them.