Why I bought no clothes in the last 1,5 years, and here’s how I refresh my wardrobe

I assume that after dozens of such social awareness campaigns by now you kind of get it that unless you choose certified items, small independent producers, or brands that has their production in countries with proper labour rights and law enforcement you are most likely buying things made in sweatshops, or worse: by kids who can’t be in school because they are sewing your cheap dress 15 hours a day. I mean, seriously, if brands would represent the working conditions of the people who make their products then their ads would look like this:

Let’s say you have compassion and you refuse to buy clothes made by kids or abused workers. What are your options? Ethical shopping? Second hand? Making your own? I did it all, and here’s what I think.

Ethical Shopping is a pain in the ass

If you ever tried to be responsible shopper you realise that ethically produced garments are not particularly easy to find, it needs a lot of information-digging and when you manage to find some the choice is usually poor and it will cost you way more than a tour to H&M. Let’s take for example a quest to find a bit more elegant boots for autumn. In my city there are around 3 small shops declared to sell only ethically produced shoes. Here I can choose of around 10 pairs of shoes, 5 of them which I don’t like, none of them look elegant and none of them are boots.

I can order shoes online from independent local producers from abroad, wait for delivery, fill out a tax form and pay VAT and hope that shoe size 38 really fits my foot (around half of the time I need to buy size 39. I just never know until I try them on). If you think it’s quite complicated compared to just walking into the nearest fashion store (5 minutes from home for me) where there is a variety of hundreds of shoes of all sort for low price — you are right.

If you are thinking that everything should be the produced ethically and fair fashion should be the only option available — you are also right. But until we create this ideal world this is the kind of game you have to play through if you want to buy an ethically produced pair of shoe, dress, a trouser or anything else.

The myth of the ethical shopper — an eye opening overview about how difficult is to implement working solution despite consumers’ need for sweatshop-free clothes.

This is by no means an excuse to just keep on not caring! You can, for example….

Make your own

Self made items make up round 40% of my jewelries and around 5% of my clothes.

I made some skirts and costumes while I had sewing machine. I had to leave the machine behind when I moved to another country and I haven’t yet found space and time for a new one :/ It’s great fun though — given that you have lots of time. The irritating thing is that it’s also difficult to know where and how the fabric is made. A fabric of 100% cotton for example can be traced back to Uzbekistan, who has a terrible human rights record enslaving it’s own citizens to work on cotton farms. 
As I said, we live in a world where ethical shopping is a pain in the ass.

Second Hand

Many second hand clothe stores (here in my town at least) are run by the Salvation Army so it is a great way to get cheap and unique clothes while supporting a good cause. But why should I spend money on clothes, while I can live in….

…The World of Free

Considering all of the options above a bit more than 12 months ago I decided to make life simple and not buy clothes anymore. I was curious how long I can go with it living in the city where cheap dresses are tempting me from fashion store windows every day. Quite long, apparently.

No shopping? Jeez! How do you refresh your wardrobe?? Well, mostly by Clothes Swaps. We exchange goods with other girls. In my city Clothes Swaps just pop up all the time. To illustrate what can people find in ClotheSwaps:

And much more. 75% of all clothes in my wardrobe comes from swaps.

You don’t have clothes swaps in your town? What holds you back from starting one?

There is also giveAway: People often get bored of things or don’t feel like having them anymore. If they are nice then they don’t throw them out but give them away. In the last 2 cities I lived there are city-wide popular online give-away platforms to facilitate the circulation of free goods. It works really well for bigger, more costly items like furnitures. I got my two shelves and my madrass and got rid of a storage full of stuff via these plattforms.

Around 10% of my clothes and jewelries came from giveAway.

And then there is MovingFriends. Moving people always leave lots of good things behind. I myself gave away a big bag of great clothes when I moved purely because I couldn’t take all with me when I moved to another country.

Around 10% of the content of my wardrobe and jewelries came from Moving Friends.

See there are plenty of other ways to look fab than fuelling a garment industry that is based on exploiting 3rd world citizens.

Do I really need to buy a new dress?

During my last 12 months every time I passed by a shop window and saw something nice, I asked myself: Do I really need this?

If you are living in the developed part of the world your wardrobe is most like already full of clothes. You probably don’t have real need for getting yet another trouser or yet another skirt. You are going to a homeparty on Saturday? You will look amazing in clothes you already have. Or are you afraid that people will talk about you?

What about that “feeling good” that comes with buying a new dress?

I have it. Every time I clothe swap. Plus that thrilling feeling that it was all free. The good feeling comes from having something new and not from having less money.

I noticed before that often when I feel like I want to have something new is because I’m sad and getting something new is a way to cheer myself up.

Well, if I need a new trouser to make me happy then I have a much bigger problem, and a new trouser will definitely not solve it.

But if I’m really in need of a quick mood-fix then I call a friend to share a drink, do something fun, or go for a run or to a gym class then take a cold shower. Active exercise+cold shower do wonders to your mood and healthy too — unlike the environment those factory workers are working in Bangladesh.

But the clothes you swap or get for free is most likely produced in sweatshops, so what’s the point?

Let’s say that used item you got from the giveaway was produced in sweatshop. What then? If we throw them away that would generate mass amount of garbage and real need to get clothes ‘cos probably you should throw away almost everything you own. Is that a great solution?

By swapping and giving away you break the Buy New — Throw Away — Buy new consumption cycle and prolong the life of garments, reduce the amount of stuff being thrown away in a given period of time (and you make some people happy).

You are right that clothes swapping and such is not THE solution. It doesn’t change how things are made in the first place. But it helps dealing with a situation we already have. So instead of asking “Is that swapped thing produced in a sweatshop?” you might ask “How can I bring the most out of the situation and how can I work toward a better one?”

By the way, working towards a better one: There are (thankfully) lots of organisations working to break that line of unethical production →excessive consumption →waste generating. There are probably some great local ones in your town you can find and work together with. There are also many global ones. Besides refusing to buy clothes I love and support the work of The Story of Stuff and Fashion Revolution but there are much more out there.

The collective will of big groups of people has enormous power. 200 years ago almost no one cared about gay rights, gender equality or equal rights for people all skin-colours. But thanks to big groups of people working together to change things for the better we evolved towards more equalitarian societies. 
I really hope we don’t have to wait two more centuries in order to have enough people care about the working conditions of those who make your clothes.

About me: Girl, age 31. Working in an office daytime, drawing webcomics about social and environmental issues nighttime. See them here>>