Barter Societies.
Hear me out. Pre-coin world. Where money didn’t matter but we just used goods, services, and other created items traded for survival. If we farmed we traded our produce, if we hunted we traded our meat..etc. You get it. What could a barter society look like today? What could you trade and is this something we should start thinking about? ….Maybe, I’m getting a little ahead of myself. Preparing for a world economic collapse does seem extensive but in my lifetime I’ve lived through crazier events.
Yesterday morning as I parked my car across from my apartment, a man driving a big gas truck stops alongside me, beeps his horn for me to turn around, which I do, leans over the passenger side seat through the window and goes, “Hey I love your car.” I say, “Thanks, me too.” Then he says, “Diesel?” I say, “Yup.” He goes, “Perfect, when we run out of gas you won’t have any issues.” I let out an unexpected, “Oh” and chuckle.
I’m so intrigued, what does he know that I don’t.
This is what I’m unsolicitedly getting fed at 9AM on the streets of Brooklyn. So yes, maybe it’s why my mind goes to thinking about barter societies.
Applying the theory of barter societies to the world of clothing in our time where our systems have been unexpectedly challenged by the new US administration. There are two predictions I’d like to discuss. First the rising costs of production — clothing will become more expensive or even scarce as corporations big and small are forced to make decisions whether to keep producing or change models, if they can.
In my last post ON TREND I wrote a phrase Resale Spring/Summer, which was in jest, but there is a reality to it. Once/If the tariffs are reenacted they will slow down the process of production causing the fast fashion companies like Temu, TikTok shop, and whatever new one there is to run out of product or be unable to send it over to the United States at a reasonable cost, making the price of it unaffordable and less desirable/less likely for mass consumption. If this prediction is correct, there is more to celebrate in the coming days than I initially have been anticipating.
The second prediction is the expansion of peer-to-peer exchange of goods, including making clothing or reselling items. This could lead to the barter society I’ve been scheming about in the clothing world. “We” anticipate a resurgence in the resale market if tariffs are reenacted. The principles of a barter system would be very relevant in that situation. Could instead of the rise of resale sites like Depop, Ebay, or rental ones such as Nuuly or The RealReal we see a new system be created of exchange?
While rummaging through new tech companies and start ups in the past month I found an app that was starting to lean towards this model. They’re a clothing app called Pickle with one function of the app where you can rent a dress, jacket, etc from someone in your neighborhood for a few days or for an event. This smells like the beginnings of the new age to a Barter Society to me!
In honor of The Late Pope Francis, I have this letter from The Late Pope John Paul II, called The Image of God the Creator.
The letter was a call to the artists of the world explaining the importance of them, creation, and God. He ends his letter with a section called The “Beauty” that saves. He begins by stating that the thing that stirs in us to create, that beautiful thing in us goes on and on and on and on, that we must make sure it keeps going on generational. I love this quote he uses “Faced with the sacredness of life and the human person, and before the marvels of the universe, wonder is the only appropriate attitude.” May we always wonder. About each other, about what is next, about what was, about all things. That is the role of the artists to take the beauty within us, create wonder and inspiration.
The late Pope John Paul II goes on to talk about the enthusiasm and beauty that is transcendence from the wonder. How all these things are tied to our risen savior Christ. Who contemplates joy, an unspeakable joy that we must transmute as artists. Even in times like these we must remember to turn to joy.
Today, I sit at a crossroad of wonder, heartache, joy, and creation each day. Thinking about what was in my life, what I loved, where my studies, research was going and where it is now. How my path had felt so right and now feels lost. How there are things I desire so much and still don’t have. I feel loss and love all at once in the same moment. I understand this unspeakable joy, wonder, and transcendent creation Pope John Paul II was speaking of.
If a barter society comes one day then I would trade my art, my words, maybe practically my sewing skills. Yet the mystery of thought and love deep in me is what costs the most.
Could that be bartered? According to The Late Pope John Paul II, it is worthy of the world.
“None can sense more deeply than you artists, ingenious creators of beauty that you are, something of the pathos with which God at the dawn of creation looked upon the work of his hands. A glimmer of that feeling has shone so often in your eyes when—like the artists of every age—captivated by the hidden power of sounds and words, colours and shapes, you have admired the work of your inspiration, sensing in it some echo of the mystery of creation with which God, the sole creator of all things, has wished in some way to associate you.” - The Late John Paul II
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