“Be kind to your mind”, “
Mental health is my priority
”, “It’s okay to feel bad”, “
This Barbie Takes Prozac
”… On the e-shops of major brands and sales platforms or even confidential labels, from Primark to Praying via Amazon or Etsy, slogans referring to mental health are displayed more than ever on t-shirts and sweatshirts.
Have psychological and emotional wounds become the new stylish allies... of fashion marketing?
Or a fun way to highlight a social problem?
To discover
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Also read Showing your navel: what does this omnipresent trend in fashion say about us?
Business trend
“Selena Gomez, Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Tom Holland, Bella Hadid, Harry Styles, Kendall Jenner..., all the icons of Gen Z confide today, without taboo, about their mental health and publicly tell how anxiety affects them. makes life difficult on a daily basis,” explains Jean-Victor Blanc, psychiatrist at Saint-Antoine hospital in Paris, and co-founder of the Pop & Psy festival.
“Faced with so many celebrity secrets and normalization, the fashion industry ends up saying that something is happening... And therefore decides to act by recuperating psychological pathologies in the service of profit, as it has done. has already done before for the feminist cause.”
The goal ?
Selling more and more clothes, while most of these big brands are not taking concrete action for mental health.
However, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), mental illness and psychological disorders affect nearly 1/5 of the population in France, or 13 million French people.
Suicide is the leading cause of death between the ages of 15 and 35.
It is a reality, in 2024, impossible to ignore such a societal subject.
On TikTok, the figures speak for themselves: posts related to mental health with the hashtags #MentalHealth, #SelfCare or #MentalHealthAwareness respectively collect more than 109 billion, 50 billion and 25 billion views to date on the Chinese social network.
In France, the #MentalHealth trend already has more than 724 million views, and #MentalHealthHelps more than 2 million.
A less taboo subject
The times are changing.
The perception of mental health too.
“If its media representation has sometimes been biased - like the forced hospitalization highlighted in the film
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest,
released in 1975 - mental health is today a major player in pop culture, attests psychiatrist Jean-Victor Blanc.
Films such as
Happiness Therapy
(2015) and series such as
13 Reasons Why
(2017),
Euphoria
(2019) and
Normal People
(2020) now offer a fair representation of mental health issues while playing an important role in the fight against prejudices."
It was Britney Spears who, in the 2000s, made the connection with the world before – where it was clearly impossible to speak publicly about her mental disorders.
Today, communications are no longer as locked down.
When American singer Selena Gomez took to Instagram to announce that she suffered from bipolar disorder and that she had decided to take a break while she was hospitalized, the support of her fans and people in the profession was overwhelming. flawless.
Influencer Eileen Kelly has launched a collection of sweaters and t-shirts that raise awareness on the subject of mental health.
Instagram @eileen
“Since the Covid crisis, mental health is a less taboo subject, underlined the Ministry of Health and Prevention in a report published in March 2023. More and more media personalities – actors, singers, high-level athletes or influencers on social networks – no longer hesitate to “come out” in this area, to reveal their fragilities and psychological suffering.
Major international sporting events – the Rugby World Cup in 2023 and the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2024 – are all communication opportunities that will be used to destigmatize mental disorders, which can affect everyone during their life.”
Mental
wear
In this context, fashion, which knows how to capture the spirit of an era, this famous
zeitgeist
, seems to want to play a role in raising awareness about mental health.
Can slogans on the subject affixed to t-shirts and sweatshirts participate in this?
They allow everyone to display their feelings, their illness or to draw attention to the subject of mental health in a more fun way.
But beware of
mental washing
and aesthetic recovery.
If the commitment is not authentic, the younger generation of consumers quickly boycott.
“There must be a real commitment from the sector, as the beauty industry has already been doing for several years by providing it with strong visibility,” notes the psychiatrist.
Example with Sisley who, via his Sisley-d'Ornano foundation, has been moving the boundaries of psychiatry and mental health for more than ten years.
In other words, selling a slogan tee isn't enough.
Fashion companies must also get involved in concrete actions or get involved with associations working in the field of mental health.
Some brands are already tackling the subject head on.
At the beginning of November, the popess of vegan fashion, Stella McCartney, unveiled a limited edition of her star bag, the Falabella, on which is attached a ribbon with words from the American poet Cleo Wade: “
The ride is long but it leads you home.”
Translation: “The journey is long but it brings you home.”
This it bag is part of the
Horse Power
campaign , the result of the collaboration between the English designer and the famous doctor and writer Deepak Chopra.
The limited edition Falabella bag, by Stella McCartney, in collaboration with doctor Deepak Chopra.
Chopra Foundation
The objective?
Highlight the healing potential of horses by supporting the mental health of the younger generation.
“
Mental wear
is on the rise,” confirms Marie Dupin, fashion and lifestyle business director at NellyRodi.
Thus, Monki – the pop label of the H & M group – has already signed several of its campaigns in partnership with the NGO Mental Health Europe.
There is also EBIT (for
enjoy being in transition
), launched in the middle of a pandemic, which stands out by placing psychological disorders at the forefront of its creations.
Her clothes are very loose, very cocooning and ultimately very protective.
Just like these new stores which embody more
safe places
(safe places) than
dirty places
(sales places), like the new space of the Max Mara house, entirely in camel plush, from the walls to the ceiling, the furniture on the floor, and the decoration created to celebrate the tenth anniversary of its iconic Teddy Bear coat.
A place focused on the Zen experience and well-being that anchors fashion in reality and brings it out of its ivory tower.”
Work remains to be done to change mentalities within the fashion industry itself, where mental health problems are too often associated with creativity.
“It’s a real subject in the industry,” confirms Jean-Victor Blanc.
Particularly among fashion students, who still imagine today that you have to do very poorly to be a good designer.
The myth of the tortured creative genius is still all too present.”
So that the message on
Mental Healt Matters
t-shirts is not just a slogan…