In honor of Women’s History Month, we talked with StockX team members about the women who have influenced them, ways to support women in our communities, and more.
For this installment, we talked with StockX’s marketing manager of France, Elodie Prochet about the important women at the heart of today’s most influential streetwear brands, hype, and gaming.
This interview has been lightly edited.
Who are the women who have influenced you?
Even though I am inspired by every woman that speaks for all of us and fights for women’s rights around the world, I am also influenced by the ones that we rarely speak of. As someone that’s not into being in the spotlight, any women that make a difference within their own industry inspires me.
We sometimes know the brands and the products that we wear or love, but we don’t know who’s behind them. I am thinking of women like Mary Ann Fusco, Rei Kawakubo, and Beth Gibbs. These women helped make Streetwear brands—Supreme, Comme des Garçons, Stussy, and Union—what they are today. They focused on their passion and on expressing their creativity and perception of fashion. And what we can see today is that those brands are part of the culture and accepted by all, men and women. And that’s pretty cool. No words needed.
What are the most overrated or underrated things at the moment?
Overrated: I would say “Hype” is nowadays overrated, but it’s also quite interesting to see where this hype is coming from: is it the product itself, is it the designer behind the product, the brand, or some random fact?
Underrated: Unisex collection and campaigns. I know that more and more brands are now convinced of the unisex approach, but it’s still too early. I would love to see Fashion week for men and women altogether, where models would wear pieces that can be worn by both.
If you could give advice to your younger self, what would you say?
I would probably say to my younger self to stay focused on your goals; the rest doesn’t matter. People around you will try to make you aware of things that don’t matter. I Like the fact that I need to be mindful that I am a woman and so my path will be different. Kids don’t see the difference between boys and girls in terms of capability; it’s as soon as we grow up and are in specific situations (work, sport) that the differences are made. It shouldn’t be like that!
What is something that we can all do, regardless of gender, to lift the voices of women in our communities?
I would say not pointing out the differences between genders. Don’t focus on gender, ethnicity, or sexual orientation when acknowledging a woman’s creativity and success. She’s not a “woman” streetwear fashion designer; she’s a fashion designer. She’s not a skater girl; she’s a skater. She’s not a woman athlete; she’s an athlete.
What’s next for you?
Video games have been a passion of mine since I was very young. I’ve never played pro, but I used to write some reviews when I was based in France. And I still play today. Gaming is something that is still very male-dominated and a lot of women never actually played video games because they found it so inaccessible and quite intimidating. I would like to help break this ceiling and make it accessible to everyone.
