The history of consumer behavior has been studied intensively for a generation. While researchers initially focused on Western Europe and colonial America, questions surrounding consumerism are at the origin of economic, political and cultural analyses worldwide. The availability of new commodities produced profound social and cultural changes. Important comparative studies identify some notable similarities in economic development, urbanization, and commercial growth in parts of Asia and Europe. This article contributes to the debate, examining the way fashion works and the attempts by authorities to limit fashion activities in two world regions. Fashion took root as part of wider economic and social changes, signaling wider societal transformations. Early modern governments struggled to contain plebeian consumption, as economic systems evolved. Clothing is political. Over the early modern period, a growing volume of new fabrics gradually redefined common clothing and encouraged wider participation in fashion. Urban men and women, outside the elites, embraced this cultural “project”. Fashion systems flourished in both Eurasian regions in this study, albeit with different social constraints and economic priorities. The reception of Indian cotton textiles is at the heart of this analysis. In Tokugawa Japan and northwest Europe, Indian cottons represented fresh new additions to their material worlds. Indian cottons shaped fashion cultures, and the material qualities of these textiles presented unique challenges to existing social hierarchies.