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The fashion industry has to change. Past seasons have seen brands and creatives focus on a ‘buy more’ model. So much so that clothing production has doubled over the last 15 years and consumers are buying more clothing than ever before but wearing the same clothes for shorter periods of time. All of this not only results in a staggering amount of pollution and waste, but by 2050 the fashion industry could suck up 25% of the world’s carbon budget. So, to avoid a climate faux pas, how can the fashion industry change?
To avoid warming our planet by 2 degrees Celsius by 2050, fashion’s next biggest trend must be about reducing the number of new clothes that we buy and wasting less. It turns out that the smallest wardrobes are the most sustainable wardrobes. To achieve this we’ll have to tackle the mindset of fast fashion brands churning out 100,000 of new styles yearly and learn how to shop less as consumers.
It’s Time To Embrace Slow Fashion
As consumers, our lead role is to buy less. Ideally, it’s estimated that the average person would need to reduce the number of new clothes we buy by 75%. That means moving away from the fast fashion model and buying clothes for the long run. Fast fashion brands design clothing to go out of style and fall apart after a few wears to encourage new purchases. But, slow fashion focuses on well-made pieces that you can wear for years.
Sustainable wardrobes are all about investing in classic staples like a seasonless blazer, a well-fitting pair of jeans, sturdy boots or other key pieces that you can wear again and again season after season. Well made clothing can withstand wear and can be mended to last for years to come. That means buying fewer pieces and producing less waste too.
Even with fast fashion brands churning out styles made from recycled fabrics or being made ‘consciously’, the reality is that a lot of those pieces are only made with a percentage of recycled fabrics. And, those same fast fashion brands are still producing 100,000 styles yearly with their ‘conscious’ or recycled collections only accounting for a small percentage of their total output.
Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.
Produce. Buy. Wear. Waste. That’s a linear fashion model. Over the last two decades that model has only lead to an increase in resources used and landfill waste. Since 2020, we’ve doubled the volume of textiles that end up in landfills. In 2018, we threw out 11.3 million tons and recycled just 15%. This is a waste of resources like water or the land used to produce cotton. Did you know that it takes an estimated 700 gallons of water to produce 1 t-shirt?
Produce. Buy. Wear & Re-wear. Recycle. Some brands are encouraging a circular fashion model. Before you think about trashing old clothes that will ultimately end up in landfills, these brands will recycle your clothing for you. For Days will pay you in store credit to mail clothing to them (whatever the condition) to be recycled. Levis allows customers to send in jeans to be repaired, resold or recycled. And, more and more brands are finding other ways to recycle clothing and reduce the amount of new resources used and waste produced.
These are two small solutions that consumers can be a part of when it comes to combating waste and the fast fashion model. They’re not perfect and they’re not the full solution to help mitigate the fashion industry’s role in climate change. But, like all sustainable actions, even small steps can make a big change, especially when brands and consumers are engaged in the solutions together.
