LOS ANGELES — When Taylor Swift wore Cassey Ho’s signature pirouette skort, the internet spun in a frenzy to find it.

Sales soared, TikTok feeds featured it, and Ho, whose brand Popflex was already a favorite in the fitness-meets-fashion world, watched her design cement itself in the pop culture zeitgeist.

“I was numb. I didn’t know how to feel because this was the biggest thing ever,” said Ho, who self-identifies as a Swiftie.

More significant to her was that the design — a wide-band, athletic skort with the romanticism of ballet, the practicality of leggings, and added perks like pockets — was a design Ho fought hard to patent.

Ho always wanted to be a designer.

“I used to make my own dance costumes, my own Halloween costumes, and dresses for prom for my friends,” she said. 

It’s a memory steeped in tulle and tenacity — but one that clashed with her upbringing.

“Growing up, Chinese and Vietnamese-American, raised by immigrant parents, that was something that they did not want me to do,” Ho said. “They told me that you had to be a doctor, a lawyer or a failure.”

But Ho eventually found her way into the fashion industry, building Popflex and Blogilates, two size-inclusive lifestyle and activewear brands that solved the simple problems women found with existing designs.  

Ho knew there would be copies when she designed the Pirouette skort in 2022. So when an overseas fast fashion juggernaut copied her design, Ho didn’t crumble — she patented it.

“That whole experience made me feel like I need to protect my designs with a design patent,” she said. “That pirouette skort was the first design that I have ever patented.”

The victory was immediate.

Hundreds of knockoffs were scrubbed from online storefronts. But the celebration was short-lived.

Not long after she was awarded the patent, Swift’s twirl sparked trend spotting across social media, and the copycats multiplied — but this time, Ho said, they were appearing in the aisles of major American retailers.

“My work is being stolen and sold right in front of me, and these big corporations, which are worth multi-billions of dollars, can’t even afford to pay the original artist just a fraction of that for stealing my work?” Ho said with exasperation. “It doesn’t make sense. What upsets me the most is them not taking responsibility for it.”  

The modern trend of fashion theft, more commonly known as ‘duping’, is as old as couture itself. Intellectual property attorney Gina Bibby, a partner at Withers Berman LLP, sees it often.

“Brands look to other brands, whether they’re big or small, for inspiration,” she said. “Sometimes finding that inspiration comes with infringing others’ intellectual property rights.” 

But enforcing a patent isn’t just hard. It’s costly.

“If you’re willing to pay for a patent, you have to be willing to enforce it,” Bibby said. “And enforcing patents is very, very, very expensive… you could be spending upwards of two, three million in litigation.”

For many independent designers, that kind of legal warfare is rarely sustainable, but Bibby said getting a patent is still worth it.  

“One thing you can do, rather than going the litigation route, is you can license your design,” Bibby said.

She also points out that consumers are becoming less tolerant of copying, especially for brands they’ve built relationships with. 

“Public shaming goes a long way. It may not stop the infringer from doing what they’re doing, but I think it’s an impediment,” Bibby said.  

And that’s the weapon Ho is currently wielding: using her voice, her platform and her people to call out the injustices.  

“I am not going to shut up about this,” she said. “I’ve had so many independent artists, small businesses, reach out to me, telling me the same things are happening to them. If I can do this for me and set an example, then I’m really doing it for all of us.”