How does the main Russian feminist brand narvskayadostava
IN A NEW FACE "COMMUNICATIONS" WE WILL TALK ABOUT GIRLSwho came up with a common cause and achieved success in it. But at the same time to expose the myth that women are not capable of friendly feelings, and can only aggressively compete. Today, the center of attention is narvskayadostava, a St. Petersburg brand created by activist artists Lyolya Nordik and Olya Shapovalova. Her friends adhere to feminist views, so that ordinary women are removed from the lookbooks and they regularly support crisis centers for women. We talked to the founders about the attitude to their brand in Russia, customers and plans.
"Some girls"
Lola: With Olya we were united by the love of old school, old rock music, punk culture, MTV aesthetics of the 80s and 90s. We loved to go to parties and concerts, to dress up in cool outfits, in search of which we spent our weekends on the St. Petersburg flea market "Udelka". We did not have enough places where it would be really fun, so we decided to do our events. So in 2009 there were cheap'n'chic parties that worked on the principle of “cheap and chic”: we ourselves were DJs, organizers, and promoters.
We invented themes, painted posters, agreed with platforms, made out space. But despite the success (at parties, all the alcohol in the bar ended several times), we were often treated unworthily, frankly neglected our work. We asked for a not very big fee, but nevertheless we were regularly tried to pay less, or did not want to pay at all. We realized that they did not want to reckon with us, because in the eyes of people we are "just some girls." It turned out that our society is still very far from equality. So we began to study feminism and decided that we would fight for our rights. By our example, we show that girls can stand up for themselves and succeed in anything.
Olya: Lyolya and I had known each other for ten years, when we decided to make a brand. We were united not only by friendship and similar interests, but also by a long joint work, we went to rallies and femmarches a lot. However, looking at what is happening from the side, we realized that we need to look for ways to popularize our views, and not stew in our own juice.
Two years ago, on March 8, we had a campaign: we traveled on public transport with a column from which we could hear a record with statistics on violence against women in Russia and quotes from famous feminists. And on May 8, on the eve of the “holiday with tears in our eyes”, we arranged a one-day installation “Declaration of feelings” in the Vertical Gallery. She was devoted to the manifestation of feelings by men - in particular, tears: we wanted to show that the patriarchy is pressing on everyone. It was then that we thought that we had long wanted to make clothes - and she could promote our ideas.
"And so it will come down"
Olya: All our difficulties, that two years ago, that now, come up against the absence of external financing. On the one hand, it’s very cool that we don’t owe anything to anyone, on the other, it slows down the process. We live in St. Petersburg, there are low wages, and the prices are the same as in Moscow, therefore saving and postponing is difficult. We chipped in seven thousand rubles and ordered our first batch of socks. There were very few of them, but we preferred quality over quantity. We still adhere to this position, since all things are done primarily for ourselves.
Lola: In fact, at that time we didn’t have enough money even for the minimum lot, but we persuaded the sock factory to be smaller, promising to order in the future only from them. By some miracle, they agreed. If it is possible to postpone, then it is not so difficult to set up production: you just need to do a search on the Internet and visualize ideas. We did not have the financial opportunity to immediately release a full-fledged collection, so we began to produce models in turn, and it worked.
We are lucky that we have design friends who have always supported us with advice. We are especially grateful to the creator of the brand Circle of Unity, Misha Ryko, who shared contacts and experience, helped to avoid mistakes and talked about production. Also, we were very supported by the guys from the 8-store and Otdel stores - they immediately believed in us. Otdel gave development advice and bought our stuff from the very beginning, which helped us a lot financially.
We made a rip-off Thrasher logo, drew a print in the same style, but with the word “Feminist” - such an irony over machismo in skateboarding and extreme sports
Olya: Another difficulty is the irresponsibility of people. Apart from the factory that makes socks for us, all other offices are incredibly careless. We constantly get married, people break deadlines, and in response to our complaints, not only do they not admit mistakes, but also try to convince them that "everything is in order." Error in pantone? "Just half a ton." Error in the indent? "And so it will come down." Error in print size? "It is not visible." Enumerate can be infinite.
LOLYA: We were convinced that we have a terrible system of consumer protection in our country. If you order small lots and get a marriage, it is cheaper to spit and reorder things elsewhere or pick up things like they are, than try to defend the rights, order an examination and go to court, where there is no guarantee of victory. Unfair production use it. Therefore, it is always important to make samples before launching a game, and also to keep a clear description of the technical task and all changes in the working correspondence.
Olya: So we always bring quality to mind. For pants and socks, choose cotton with a small admixture of synthetics, and for T-shirts - only one hundred percent cotton. We carry all these things ourselves and are very pleased with them.
Manifest field
LOLYA: Ideally, we want to do not only merch, but also more complex things. So far, there is not enough money for it: production only becomes more expensive, but in principle we don’t want to inflate product prices. It is important for us to do quality things, we will never use short-lived, poor-quality materials to make it cheaper, earn more, and provoke the buyer to buy a new thing because of the rapid deterioration of the previous one.
It is equally important for us to create models in which an intellectual message is laid, a cultural code. Independent fashion for us is a manifesto field. We are inspired by youth subcultures, art and films. The collection of football shirts dedicated to perestroika cinema symbolizes not just a love for cult films like Courier, Assa, or Rock-style Tragedy, but also symbolizes our connection to the generation of young people of the late 80s trying to live and breathe freely in the era stagnation despite degradation of the country. In today's Russia, we feel the same way.
We also love to crack recognizable codes of pop culture to pay attention to the problems of discrimination in various youth spheres. For example, we made a rip-off Thrasher logo, drew a print in the same style, but with the word "Feminist" - such an irony over skateboarding machoism. In the world of extreme sports, it is in principle difficult for girls to gain respect and recognition. I do not mean victories in competitions, but relations within the community: most women face sexist jokes, objectivization and ridicule. This is a hard psychological pressure that not everyone can withstand - especially those who are not very confident in themselves. Even sportswomen who have already achieved success are constantly exposed to bullying, I will never forget the hellish comments on Youtube videos with Lacy Baker, who at some point began to actively support Thrasher: most commentators rudely discussed her unconventional appearance and sexual orientation, and on her sporting achievements they did not care.
We also have a “Menstruation Kill Em All” T-shirt, dedicated to the first Metallica album, ironic about the prejudices about menstruation and the stereotype that heavy music is supposedly not for girls.
Social networks and support of crisis centers
Olya: Sometimes in social networks there are strange people who leave rude comments under posts. We are trying to correctly explain to them that this is not worth doing, and if a person continues to be rude and bend his line, we block it.
Lola: It is sometimes impossible to regulate the flow of negativity that comes from haters - for example, this was the case with the last shoot for which Olya photographed Bella Rapoport in her underwear for our #narvskayadostava_speakup heading. When we notice bulling outside our accounts, we always try to stand up for the person and besiege the haters with arguments, as far as energy and strength is enough. It is clear that it is impossible to convince them, but for us it is important to support the person who is being insulted. In general, we were lucky with the instagram audience, the people there are friendly and informed.
Olya: We have very good and cool subscriber / -ki, thanks in large part to bloggers with whom we are friends - we shot many of them in lookbooks. There was a case when we shot Milli Oli, Olya Kass and Katya Valera. We contacted each of them separately, and on the site it turned out that they already knew each other, so it turned out very cool and fun! The last time we wrote to the story was that we needed models for shooting, so several other girls responded, who also turned out to be familiar.
Lola: The story of American Vogue is interesting because they found us themselves. It is noteworthy that at that time we ourselves wrote to several large Russian media about fashion and culture, but no one answered us. When Liane contacted us, we didn't even immediately believe. After publication, the interest of local media woke up instantly.
We transfer funds from the sale of "F is for feminism" bags to crisis centers for women - this is an example of how to take part in solving a large-scale problem as little as possible
Olya: We have a shop on Etsy, where we sell mainly abroad. After the BBC Three film and the German program about Russian women, we had a lot of buyers from England and Germany. They constantly order from the USA, Australia and Japan, but for us the guys from Russia are more important, because we are trying to change something in the heads of people here. It happens that you send things to some distant village and you do not understand how these people learned about us. And sometimes some gentle teenager chooses socks or underwear of his beloved, and then you think that this game is still worth the candle!
LOLYA: It is important to us that there are many politically active and creative people among our audience. After personal meetings with subscribers, we are always delighted with how cool, talented, and conscious they are. We really wanted to share these people with the world, so we are happy to call them on set and give them the opportunity to talk about their experiences. It is important for us to talk about the projects of other activists / s, to inform our audience about important events, lectures, petitions.
We continue to transfer funds from the sale of "F is for feminism" bags to crisis centers for women - this is an example of how to take part in solving a large-scale problem with a small effort and educate the audience in their desire to help others. Now more and more people are starting not only to sell their merchandise, but also to transfer money to charity. Among our friends are, for example, Nika Vodwood, Sveta Streltsova, Yulya Frolova. This is a very good trend.
They like to call us the only femmark in Russia, but this is not so. In addition to us, there are several other projects related to clothing, activism and feminism: this is the sewing cooperative "Shvemy" and TO "Nadya". There are still Goldman sisters in Moscow, we met them on Faces & Laces - we don’t know their political position, but they do things similar in spirit. Surely there is someone else about whom we do not know - we would very much like to know.
Women's cooperative
Lola: We immediately agreed on horizontal interaction. In fact, we are a women's cooperative, there are two of us, and all of our business lies with us. Decisions are made together: if a compromise is impossible, then the idea does not pass. Now we are working in shifts six in six days: we solve big issues together, and we deal in sales, correspondence, sending orders and other routine in turn. It turned out to be more convenient than synchronous. We often have disputes on the topic of politics or feminism, we are not always ready to accept each other’s ideas, but this is normal: we are different people with our own preferences and ambitions.
Olya: It happens very hard. Although we have been friends and work together for a long time, it happens that our opinions diverge diametrically. Plus, when you communicate with a person almost 24/7, sooner or later fatigue comes, which results in conflicts. But, in my opinion, quarrels that can be resolved are an integral part of the creative process. After the New Year, we decided to work according to a new scheme that Lola mentioned, which had a positive effect on work. But despite all the difficulties, I can not imagine what I would do now without a brand.
Lola:Also, do not forget (first and foremost by ourselves) that we are both artists and, besides narvskayadostava, we have other equally important projects. I personally would like to seriously engage in music, art and photography. This year I entered the school of the art "What to do" - I hope this will help me to combine art with fem and ecoactivism.
Olya: The brand takes physical and moral strength, but it does not bring a lot of money - only this year we were able to make a profit, which you can not invest in production. At the same time in two years we have created a good springboard for the implementation of ideas. Still, narvskayadostava is first and foremost a media art project that includes us, artists, and our undertakings, and only then a commercial story. Now I am working on a project that was born from our #narskayadostava_speakup column. There will appear many more interesting women who will tell about their path to feminism. A lot of plans, would be enough strength!
Photo: narvskayadostava / Vkontakte
