how the Harper’s Bazaar Ukraine public talk unfolded

A conversation about accessibility in Ukrainian fashion

The landscape of Ukraine’s fashion industry is changing in response to today’s challenges, and inclusivity has become a responsibility of the field. When fashion addresses real needs, functionality is born. That is why Harper’s Bazaar Ukraine launched the project “Functional Code of Resilience” — a series of interviews with Ukrainian designers about creating clothing with function. Its continuation was the public talk Inclusive Fashion: Code of Resilience, held on the second day of Ukrainian Fashion Week and marking the Week’s first event at the Mystetskyi Arsenal.

Clothing with function is an act of care: it adapts, supports, and remains beautiful and aesthetic. Ukrainian brands are pioneers in this development. By collaborating with prosthetics centers and focus groups of people with disabilities, they find solutions that ensure ease of dressing and wearing, durability, practicality, and style at the same time. Brands embed function into the design of every piece, emphasizing that such clothing is neither “special” nor “medical.” This became the key idea of the panel discussion Inclusive Fashion: Code of Resilience.

The event’s speakers included Andriy Moskin and Andreas Bilous (Andreas Moskin), Ihor Sidletskiy (Sidletskiy), Olena Fil (Juliya Kros), as well as Superhumans Center graduate Zakhar Biriukov. The talk was moderated by Harper’s Bazaar Ukraine fashion editor Alisa Yermolenko.

During the discussion, brand representatives spoke about their first steps in working with adaptive clothing and the main challenges they faced: from the need to develop technologies and build functionality from scratch, to difficulties in sourcing quality fittings.

Zakhar Biriukov, in turn, shared insights into today’s Ukrainian market for functional clothing. The veteran highlighted what the field of barrier-free fashion still lacks and stressed the importance of collaboration between brands and people with disabilities, as well as careful pre-testing of products.

In addition, Andreas Moskin, Sidletskiy, and Juliya Kros revealed their upcoming plans for developing the inclusive direction and expanding their lines of functional clothing.

Summing up their experience, the speakers offered several pieces of advice to young designers who plan to take steps toward accessibility.

After the discussion, guests of Inclusive Fashion: Code of Resilience moved to the Ukrainian Fashion Week’s “Clothing with Function” zone to explore functional fashion in person.