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Adrian Woods: Brunel University, Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK
Anne-Marie Coles: Brunel University, Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK
Keith Dickson: Brunel University, Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK
ACKNOWLEDGMENT: Received October 1998 Revised May 1999
Introduction
The need for certain professional groups to obtain particular legal knowledge through specialist training has been raised as a more general issue elsewhere (Browell, 1996). Industrial and commercial designers are one such group, increasingly faced with the need to understand complex legal issues involved in design copying and copyright law. This paper reports specifically on empirical findings about responses to design copying in furnishing fabrics, based on the results of a study, undertaken in the School of Business and Management at Brunel University. The study was carried out in two main parts. Face to face interviews with firms and other organisations in the UK, Italy and the USA were undertaken in order to develop a view to the comparative differences and similarities faced by firms with three different legislative systems. In addition a wider statistical survey was carried out in the UK in order to investigate the scope and scale of the national problem, including attitudes to the adequacy of current training.
The growing importance of design in textiles manufacture has been so apparent in the post-war period that one analysis claims that the UK has the largest number of education and training courses in textile and apparel design per capita in the world. While the education of designers has been evolving, there has also been a developing career structure for designers in UK and foreign textile firms and a parallel, expanding freelance design sector (Davies, 1998). Moreover, trained specialist designers have become a key competitive asset in an increasingly global market for textiles and especially for furnishing fabrics.
Yet in the UK, the furnishing sector is very fragmented, being dominated by small and medium-sized firms with very few large, integrated players. It is estimated to be worth in excess of Pounds 5 billion of which textiles is the largest section after floor coverings (Carpets and Furnishings, 1988). Within the textiles industry whole, a separate furnishings fabrics sector has been identified (Keynote, 1993) which is, however, still very general, including bedding and household linen. Interior design trade fairs attract textiles firms which are primarily producing fabric...