Right now the most valuable currency in the aspiration economy is newness, novelty and youth. Marketing and advertising, especially across fashion, is all about selling a lifestyle and image for your current self. Future chronological chapters of your life are deemed irrelevant. But these partnerships challenge that assumption. They sell the idea... See more

In the old world of broadcast communication that Naomi Klein wrote about, promotion was limited to a few channels, so multinationals with massive advertising budgets had the power to sell a brand monoculture. Now every night, on Twitter, on Instagram, on TikTok, we scroll and see brands smushed up next to real people in the feed. Branding

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The brand is about abundance - about being a student in life. Dua is the final realization of a European pop star - embodying truly equal parts work and play, eshewing contemporary it girl capitalist side ventures (i.e., a shoddily-made skincare/makeup brand) in favor of promoting cultural and literary fluency, not likely for any large monetary... See more