Dr Benjamin Wild
Reader in Fashion Narratives, Division Head for Fashion Communication
Currently accepting PhD students.
A cultural historian, I am interested in the function of stories and the utility of storytelling to spur social responsibility and steer systems change, chiefly within the fashion industry.
I believe history is a dynamic agent in people’s lives that informs their values and behaviours. I seek to understand how the past shapes the stories people tell about themselves, their communities and cultures, and the form these stories take when expressed through materiality, particularly dress, to spark critical reflection about the role of storytelling and culture in sustaining action to tackle the global challenges the fashion industry poses.
Academic and professional qualifications
Fellow of the Royal Historical Society
Previous Employment
Conde Nast College of Fashion & Design, London
Sotheby’s Institute of Art, London
Victoria & Albert Museum, London
Academic service (administration and management)
Division Head: Fashion Communication (Manchester Fashion Institute)
Executive Board, Research Collective for Decoloniality & Fashion
Visiting and honorary positions
- Course leader, Victoria and Albert Museum, ‘On The Bias: Fashion’s Obsession With The West’ (16 April -21 May 2024).
- Course leader, Victoria and Albert Museum, ‘Royal Dress and Appearance: Medieval to Modern’ (14-15 March 2020).
Editorial Board membership
- Editor, Journal of Dress History.
- Executive committee member, Association of Dress Historians.
- Executive committe member, Research Collective for Decoloniality and Fashion.
Undergraduate teaching
Fashion Cultures
External examiner roles
MA International Fashion and Media Management, European College of Business and Management
Postgraduate research supervision
Available for MA and PhD supervision
Current PhD Supervision:
- Julian Randall, ‘“I’m So Self-Conscious”: The Rise of Luxury Fashion Shopping Among Black Consumers’ (Principal Supervisor)
- Jennifer Richards, ‘Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion’ (Principal Supervisor)
- Sun Tiantian, ‘Chinese Style in Contemporary Fashion’ (Second Supervisor)
- Naomi Kayayan, ‘The Dynamics of Dynamic Teaching and Learning: Engaging Students as Partners in UK Conservatoire Piano Departments’ (Director of Studies)
Completed research supervision
- Sophia Dolores Stamatopoulou, ‘Exploring Gender-Neutral Fashion as a Product of a Dual Heritage Maker’ (MRes: Principal Supervisor)
- Layla Regan, ‘Collective Dreams: Constructed Nostalgia in Contemporary Chinese Fashion Photography’ (MRes: First Supervisor)
Press and media appearances or contributions
- Ted Talk - ‘Time: Why we need to rethink the narrative of fashion’ (January 2004)
- The Conversation, ‘Fashion needs stronger storytelling that is more inclusive, relevant and responsible’. (20 March 2024)
- The Independent, ‘Why there’s still a place for London Fashion Week in 2024’. (16 February 2024)
- The Telegraph, ‘How the quintessentially British Barbour became a fashion must-have’. (4 January 2024)
- The Mill (Manchester), ‘Chanel have been secretive about the location of their Manchester show. Thank god Mancunians love to gossip…’. October 2023
- The Daily Express, ‘Sophie’s wedding style ‘may have raised eyebrows’ – but she wanted to make a ‘statement’. June 2023
- BBC news, ‘The outfits Kate, Camilla and other royals wore to the coronation’. May 2023
- The Wall Street Journal, ‘Actually, Guys, You Won’t Be Ridiculed for Wearing This‘. April 2023
- The Independent, ”Your workout is my warm-up’: How did the slogan T-shirt become so basic?’. March 2023
- The Wall Street Journal, ‘Can Older Guys Wear Cropped Pants? Let’s Find Out‘. September 2022
- Channel 5 documentary, Elizabeth I and Elizabeth II: Britain’s Golden Queens, (March 2020)
- Ted Talk - ‘The Magnificence of Marginality’ (May 2019)
Research
Research Interests
- Fashion’s role in social narratives
- Global histories of human dress & appearance
- De-centring ‘western’ fashion methodologies & narratives
A cultural historian, I am interested in the function of stories and the utility of storytelling to spur social responsibility and steer systems change, chiefly within the fashion industry. I believe history is a dynamic agent in people’s lives that informs their values and behaviours. This is apparent in the use of material culture to express fundamental human experiences. Objects, which store and stimulate our senses, become conduits of memory, connecting people across chronologies, cultures and geographies. This is particularly the case with clothing and dress because they have formed part of people’s self and social identities since the Palaeolithic and are performed, sometimes reluctantly and unknowingly, by everyone. The memories stirred by the dress people wore are at once comforting and concerning, especially when they relate to fashion, which is imbricated with the communication of ‘western’-centred narratives that assert how humans should and should not be, sustaining interpersonal inequalities and injustice. I seek to understand how the past shapes the stories people tell about themselves, their communities and cultures, and the form these stories take when expressed through materiality, particularly dress, to spark critical reflection about the role of storytelling and culture in sustaining consistent action to tackle the global challenges the fashion industry poses.
I explore these ideas further in my recent book project, Hang-Ups: Reflections on the Causes and Consequences of Fashion’s ‘Western’-centrism (Bloomsbury 2024), which argues that purposeful and permanent change within the fashion industry and fashion education is more likely if it is understood how the contemporary industry became ‘western’-centric. To institute effective change, it is necessary to revert to first principles and understand how the fashion industry developed into what it is today. During a period when the concepts of fashion, history and culture are being questioned, and with suggestions they are reaching their nadir, the imperative to understand the extent to which they relate, and facilitate the presentation of people’s fashionable bodies, seems pressing, even urgent. Hang ups explores the origins and consequences of the fashion industry’s ‘western’-centrism by focusing on nine binaries, defined in the crucible of empire, that continue to be sites of negotiation as the ‘west’s’ traditions and ideals are contested by different cultural perspectives and changing global realities.
In a related project, I am writing Appropriation for Bloomsbury’s new ‘Fashion in Action’ series. The book offers an introductory guide to the topic of cultural (mis)appropriation in fashionable dress and appearance.
The relevance of my research focuses encourages me to share my work with broad audiences. For example, in January 2024, I delivered a TED talk ‘Timeout: Why We Need to Re-think the Narrative of Fashion’.
Conference organisation
New Research in Dress History (in conjunction with the Association of Dress Historians) , 21 April 2023. Further information here.
Face Off: The Provocation and Possibilities of Masks and Head Coverings, 13-14 January 2021. Further information here.
Books
Wild, B.L., 2024. 'Hang-Ups Reflections on the Causes and Consequences of Fashion’s ‘Western’-Centrism', Bloomsbury Visual Arts.
Wild, B.L., 2020. 'Carnival to catwalk: Global reflections on fancy dress costume'.
Wild, B., Walker, T., 2016. 'A Life in Fashion The Wardrobe of Cecil Beaton'.
Wild, B.L., 2012. 'The Wardrobe Accounts of Henry III'.
Book Chapters
Campbell, J., Gallina, H., Clayton, L., Wild, B.L., Raco, M., 2022. 'Talking fashion'. In Insights on Fashion Journalism, pp. 160-174.
Wild, B., 2019. 'Clothing Royal Bodies: Changing attitudes to royal dress and appearance from the Middle Ages to Modernity'. In The Routledge History of Monarchy, Routledge.
Wild, B., 2019. 'Romantic Recreations: Remembering Stuart Monarchy in Nineteenth-Century Fancy Dress Entertainments'. In Remembering Kings and Queens in Early Modern England and France: Reputation, Reinterpretation, Reincarnation, Palgrave MacMillan.
Wild, B., 2019. 'Qui copier quand il n'ya plus personne à suivre? L'imitation dans la mode'. In Faut il imiter pour exister ? Tous des copieurs (et tant mieux) !, Philippe Duval.
Wild, B., 2016. 'Reasserting Medieval Kingship: King Henry III and the Dictum of Kenilworth'. In Baronial Reform and Revolution in England, 1258-1267, Boydell & Brewer.
Wild, B., 2011. 'The Empress’s New Clothes: A Rotulus Pannorum of Isabella, Sister of King Henry III, Bride of Emperor Frederick II'. In Medieval Clothing and Textiles, Boydell Press.
Journal Articles
Wild, B.L., 2020. 'Critical reflections on cultural appropriation, race and the role of fancy dress costume', Critical Studies in Fashion & Beauty, 11 (2), pp. 153-173.
Wild, B., 2020. 'Liminal Luxury: Establishing the Value of Fancy Dress Costume', Luxury: History, Culture, Consumption, 6 (2), pp. 179-187.
Wild, B., 2019. 'We Need to Talk About Fancy Dress: Connections (and Complications) Between the Catwalk and Fancy Dress Costume', Fashion Theory, 26 (1), pp. 91-114.
Wild, B., 2016. 'Imitation in fashion: Further reflections on the work of Thorstein Veblen and Georg Simmel', Fashion, Style & Popular Culture, 3 (3), pp. 281-294.
Wild, B., 2016. 'Cecil beaton: Through a glass, lightly', History Today, 66 (9).
Wild, B.L., 2015. 'To have and to hold: Masculinity and the clutch bag', CRITICAL STUDIES IN MENS FASHION, 2 (1), pp. 43-54.
Wild, B., 2014. 'The civilizing process and sartorial studies', Clothing Cultures, 1 (3), pp. 213-224.
Wild, B.L., 2012. 'Royal finance under King Henry III, 1216-72: The wardrobe evidence', Economic History Review, 65 (4), pp. 1380-1402.
Wild, B.L., 2011. 'Emblems and enigmas: Revisiting the 'sword' belt of Fernando de la Cerda', Journal of Medieval History, 37 (4), pp. 378-396.
WILD, B., 2011. 'A Truly Royal Retinue: Using Wardrobe Rolls to Determine the Size and Composition of the Household of Henry III of England*', Court Historian, 16 (2), pp. 127-157.
Wild, B.L., 2010. 'A gift inventory from the reign of Henry III', English Historical Review, 125 (514), pp. 529-569.
Wild, B.L., 2010. 'Secrecy, splendour and statecraft: The jewel accounts of King Henry III of England, 1216-72', Historical Research, 83 (221), pp. 409-430.
Website
Office Location
Room RG.06
Righton Building
Manchester Fashion Institute
Manchester Metropolitan University
Cavendish Street
Manchester M15 6BG