Uncomfortable fashion: why we need to rethink our relationship with clothes

The future of fashion will be conscious, or won’t be

What a nice jacket! Where did you buy it? How much did it cost?

Until recently, we did not have many more questions regarding our clothes. But everything changed on April 24, 2013 with the collapse of the Rana Plaza in Bangladesh, that left more than 1100 dead and thousands injured, the vast majority were sweatshops employees, working in appalling conditions.

This tragic event marked a before and after for fashion business and the questions became much more uncomfortable for the textile industry: who made my clothes? Was it a child in Indonesia, an exploited Vietnamese woman or a man working in a clandestine workshop in La Matanza?

That’s why since 2015, the last week of April #FashionRevolutionWeek is celebrated.

Different fashion business entrepreneurs around the world organize hundreds of events that invite us to re-think, understand and fundamentally act towards our relationship with clothes and fashion.

“In Argentina we set up teams of “doers”, entrepreneurs and activists that cover the entire country and each one leads and organize a local initiative with his own stamp. We decided to keep a common purpose, but prioritize collective creation” explains Roi Benitez, local reference of the FashionRevolutionArgentina movement in dialogue with ACONCAGUA.

The proposals varies from workshops, fairs and talks to get to know all the local projects that are marking the path of a more sustainable fashion industry.

It is a global movement that invites us to rethink our relationship with fashion.

Roi has been working for years to improve the industry and strengthen fair trade initiatives. She thinks that now is time for a change of strategy: “We need to move from protest to proposal” she says.

Under the slogan #WhoMadeMyClothes the movement seeks to raise awareness about the problems of the industrys’ global trends like fast fashion: mass productions with slave labor in third world countries become cheap collections that rapidly go out of fashion in first world countries.

According to a study by consulting firm McKinsey & Co, fast fashion is making people consume up to 60% more clothing than in 2000, but how long each item is kept in one’s wardrobe was reduced to half the time.

(Not so) hidden costs

“Fast fashion is not free. Someone, somewhere, is paying for it” this is the key phrase coined by fashion journalist Lucy Siegle, which reverberates in the industry.

These “hidden costs” refer to exploited workers, but they also speak of the environmental costs involved in the manufacture of textiles.

The environmental impact of the textile industry is put under the microscope like never before.

In fact, many natural raw materials, such as cotton, require enormous amounts of water for their treatment and dyeing. This leads to contaminated rivers and seas due to lack of treatment.

On the other hand, while polyesters and other synthetic materials consume less water, they are derived from fossils fuels and tend to have a greater carbon footprint.

However, there’s yet another huge impact the industry needs to take care of: the textile residues that are generated not only in the production, but also before being discarded by consumers.

“I worked for 20 years in mass clothing brands. I saw many clothes and fabrics in good condition that are discarded” says Lucila Dellacasa, a sustainable designer who works recovering scraps and discarded textiles.

She adds: “After that I did not want to buy any more new fabrics, I think that the production of clothing in the world is already too big”. Lucila is also a member of Ropa Limpia Argentina, an organization that seeks to promote sustainable practices in the industry.

“I am against disposable fashion and my way of manifesting myself is to reuse it. The main challenge of working with recovered textiles is to achieve serial production, grow in scale and reuse fabrics in more traditional production systems” explains Lucila.

Invisible to the eyes

Transparency, traceability and fair work are the main strength of many social enterprises, but at the same time, achieving these values represents a huge challenge for the large global brands, which got used to hiding under the carpet all the information about working conditions and the environmental impact of their global production.

Today people buy up to 60% more clothing than in the year 2000

It is precisely in the business aspects that we need more transparency. There are many questions and the answers, in most cases, is silence.

The Fashion Transparency Index is an anual report that analyzes the biggest global brands in the fashion industry. This publication evaluates how much they reveal about their internal policies, their social practices, their care of the environment and their general impact.

The results from last year are eloquent: of 150 brands evaluated, only 10 achieved scores greater than 50/100, and none exceeded 60 points.

A skeleton in the closet

Although the numbers leave big companies in evidence, McKinsey’s study on fast fashion also points to consumers:

“The increases in sales suggest that most buyers ignore or tolerate the social and environmental costs of fast fashion” remarks the report.

However, some brands seem to be anticipating the negative condemnation from consumers and are beginning to work on the largely invisible impact of the fast fashion business.

Adidas launched shoes made with reused plastic bottles and other plastic materials that helped to clean the coasts and oceans.

They worked in cooperationwith the NGO Parley for the Oceans and has already sold thousands of pairs.

Another innovation in sustainable materials is the development of Nike with the introduction of “Nike Flyleather”.

It is a material made with 50% recycled leather fibers, uses 90% less water and generates half the carbon footprint than a pair of traditional sneakers.

Paradoxically — or not so much - one of the giants of fast fashion, H & M, recently introduced its new conscious collection called Conscious Exclusive.

It incorporates garments, footwear and accessories made with more sustainable, organic or recycled materials, such as a fiber from the eucalyptus pulp called lyocell .

Experts call it “the most environmentally friendly cellulose fiber” and, unlike cotton, requires less water in its treatment.

Although incorporating new materials and improving production processes to reduce environmental impact are good practices, the fact is that H & M continues to be an icon of fast fashion.

“The first thing big brands would have to do is reduce their production. They produce more garments than they sell” says Marina López, president of the Sustainable Fashion Association of Spain.

Sustainable fashion

In this sense, it is Patagonia that leads the vanguard with its successful “Worn wear” campaign that discourages the purchase of new clothes and encourages its customers to mend and repair their clothing.

In addition, the company founded by Yvonn Chouinard exchanges the used clothes for credit and receives the used garments that have no arrangement to recycle them.

Following this philosophy, the Argentine designer Florencia Dacal, in addition to developing DACAL, her sustainable design project reconstituting garments, decided to spread her passion for sewing.

Together with Fauna Brava they gave rise to the Sewing Social Club. “I think we should all know how to sew. Making or patching our own clothes is an empowering experience. Caring for our clothes is a way of assessing the work and resources needed to make it” says Florencia to ACONCAGUA.

The Sewing Social Club proposes a change of habit.

The Club’s proposal is in line with the three commandments of responsible consumption: “Buy less, choose well, make it last”, the phrase coined by the British designer Vivianne Westwood who transcended the world of fashion and calls for a change of habits in the role of consumers in all industries.

“We can all make an effort to make the future of fashion more sustainable. We are all involved, we all get dressed. When choosing what to wear, let us think and know that our gesture makes a difference”, concludes Florencia.

Originally posted in Aconcagua.lat on April 29