Zalando is expanding its range to include adaptive fashion, the Berlin online retailer announced on Wednesday. These are garments that adapt to the needs of people with physical disabilities.
The expanded range includes more than 140 women’s and men’s items as well as shoes from Zalando’s own brands Zign, Pier One, Anna Field, Yourturn and Even&Odd. The different products are designed for people with different types of disabilities and pay attention to accessibility. Garments in the collection are suitable for wheelchair users, people with prostheses or bandages, among other things, and have fasteners that can be easily opened. Additionally, Tommy Hilfiger’s 130-piece Adaptive collection will also be launched shortly at Zalando in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, France, Poland, Italy, Austria and Denmark.
Zalando wants to make fashion more inclusive
The launch of the new collections is part of Zalando’s “Strategy for Diversity and Inclusion,” as part of which the online retailer wants to “offer an inclusive assortment and shopping experience for underrepresented groups,” according to the online retailer’s statement. The in-house designs were developed in cooperation with “All is All”. This is a creative agency dedicated to accessibility and inclusion, helping brands implement them on their websites and collections. As part of the effort, there will also be a dedicated adaptive mode landing page and an “adaptive mark” on the Zalando website to identify adaptive garments in the future.
“We want to be the starting point for fashion where everyone feels welcome. At the moment we see a gap in the fashion market. Building an inclusive fashion range is an important building block here,” says Sara Diez, Vice President in the women’s and private label categories at Zalando. She adds that Zalando’s desire is “to make fashion even more inclusive.”