Overview

Shein is a fast-fashion retailer based out of Nanjing, China founded in 2008 that sells affordable women's clothing. The company has faced numerous controversies since being founded, including for human rights violations and trademark disputes.

History

Lana Del Rey's Red Carpet Shein Dress

In December 2021, Lana Del Rey attended Variety's 2021 Music Hitmakers Brunch. Rey wore a green, criss-cross pattern dress on the red carpet (shown below). On December 4th, Twitter^[1] user @eurodoII tweeted "absolutely losing my mind at Lana Del Rey wearing an $18 Shein dress to the Variety Awards," showing an image of a model in the dress from the Shein website next to Rey on the red carpet (shown below). The dresses appear to be the same.^[2]

Rey's choice of an $18 dress struck many as strange considering her wealth and the fact that she was on a red carpet where most people wear expensive designer clothing. The event inspired memes about the Shein dress. For example, on December 7th, Instagram^[3] page qwerticorn posted an image of Rey in the dress captioned "I got my Shein dress on tonight," gaining over 24,000 likes in a day (shown below).

Lead Poisoning Controversy

On August 14th, 2022, Twitter^[4] user @shinaamari posted a tweet about heightened lead levels in Shein clothing. The tweet gathered over 180,000 likes and over 30,000 retweets in over ten days (seen below).

Related Memes

Shein Influencer Trip was a publicity promotion by the fast-fashion online clothing company in which several influencers took a trip to China and toured a factory, where they made posts praising the clothing company. The trip was controversial because Shein runs sweatshops and has been accused of engaging in other unethical business practices. According to many posting about it online, the influencer trip was an attempt to rehabilitate the company's image.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References