Champion for Fashion. The modules she leads include Fashion Sociology and the cross-disciplinary Law, Ethics and Regulation in the Creative Industries. Her teaching in fashion cultures also explores social justice and ethics, including questions of cultural appropriation and representation.

For eight years, she led the Intellectual Property, Trade Marks and Brands module on the MA Luxury Brand Management at Goldsmiths, University of London. At Istituto Marangoni, she taught licensing and the legal aspects of fashion business on the MA in Luxury Brand Management. She has also taught at the University of Hertfordshire and Coventry University London, and served as Co-Convenor of the Society of Legal Scholars’ Open Subject Section from 2021 to 2024.

She is a contributing author to The Handbook of Fashion Law (Oxford University Press, 2025) and Series Co-Editor of Law, Creativity and Innovation at Bristol University Press. Her forthcoming chapter in Diverse Voices in Intellectual Property Law, part of Bristol University Press’s Diverse Voices series, examines UK emerging fashion designers’ experiences of copying and the inequalities that shape their access to intellectual property enforcement.

Drawing on her doctoral research, she has submitted formal evidence to the UK Intellectual Property Office’s consultation on the future of the UK designs framework. Her work has been cited in academic journals including the Columbia Human Rights Law Review, the International Journal of Cultural Property and The WIPO Journal.

She has been invited to speak at institutions including Harvard Law School, the University of Oxford, King’s College London, the Victoria and Albert Museum, Central Saint Martins, London College of Fashion, the University of Glasgow, the University of Oslo, the University of Antwerp and the Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University, New York.

Her writing and commentary have appeared in The Guardian and The Huffington Post. She has discussed copyright, image use and the rights of street-style photographers on BBC Radio 4’s You and Yours, and has been interviewed by independent fashion publication 1 Granary on numerous occasions, covering creativity, attribution and intellectual property in fashion.

For media enquiries, speaking engagements, consultancy or collaborations, please contact tania@fashionlawbusiness.com.

Tania Phipps-Rufus is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of FLB

Fashion Law & Business

Tania Phipps-Rufus is a distinctive voice in fashion law, bringing together legal scholarship, cultural analysis and industry practice to examine how fashion is made, protected and valued. Through Fashion, Law and Business and the Fashion Law Masterclasses, she has helped shape the direction of fashion law education and debate in the UK.

Tania founded Fashion, Law and Business (FLB) in London in 2013, alongside her AHRC-funded doctoral research into intellectual property in the fashion industry. It began as a meet-up group, bringing fashion, law, business and culture into conversation and building a dedicated UK community of enthusiasts and professionals.

It has since grown into an independent platform examining how law shapes fashion’s creative and commercial life. Through its essays, specialist consultancy and Fashion Law Masterclasses, Tania brings legal scholarship into industry debate and professional practice, addressing questions of creative ownership, brand protection, cultural value and the relationships through which fashion businesses grow.

In 2015, she founded the Fashion Law Masterclass series, first hosted at Condé Nast College of Fashion & Design, bringing together legal practitioners, designers and industry professionals to build legal knowledge across the industry..

Her grounding in human rights law and social justice informs her approach to fashion law, particularly questions of access to legal protection and the recognition and value of creative work. Through her consultancy, she advises designers and brands on intellectual property, brand protection and commercial agreements. She is also consulted by law firms for specialist research and expert opinion in fashion and design-rights disputes.

Tania is Senior Lecturer and Course Leader in Fashion Cultures and Business at the University of East London, where she also serves as Research and Impact