Weaving Together Fashion, Clothing + You
The fashion industry is notoriously not sustainable. For one, it has a larger global footprint than all international flights and shipping combined.
It also uses a crazy amount of water and the waste practices are often detrimental. Fast fashion is an especially uncool trend, to use industry lingo. It’s one of the many outcomes of short-term thinking. "Do I want this now?” instead of “Will I need this tomorrow?” We’re buying 60% more clothing than we were in 2000 and keeping the clothes for half as long. It’s not great. Let’s look at why that’s not a good practice and ways we can shift.
Tatiana Schlossberg’s book Inconspicuous Consumption includes a detailed, recent and dry-humored account of the complex fashion industry, and all of its shortcomings. “Fashion is a $2-3 trillion dollar industry that literally touches everyone on earth.” Stuff like that.
She paints the circular picture of clothing by reminding us that textiles come from plants. Plants need land, water and other resources, often including chemicals, to grow. You can think of buying that shirt and the ensuing environmental impact in the same way you think about the food on your plate. Someone is farming and producing it, and the decisions you make can have a big impact. And they don’t need to be bad!
Here are some facts, starting with cotton, because it’s prolific, complicated and it includes another important product: denim.
Cotton: It’s grown in 65 countries, makes up 1/3 of all fibers used in textiles, uses 3% of all agricultural land and emits 107.5 MEGAtons of CO2 each year. It also uses 16% of the world's insecticides. (Inconspicuous Consumption)
One cotton shirt needs 2,700 liters of water to be produced. That’s substantially more than you drink in a year. (World Resources Institute)
Denim, a cotton product, is another BIG drinker. It takes 3,781 liters of water to make a pair of jeans, from the production of the cotton to the delivery of the final product to the store. (World Bank)
Now we’re gonna do two more facts: One is depressing and one is exciting. Let’s get the bad out of the way and end with the good.
BAD :(
Polyester is derived from petroleum, the stuff that becomes gas, aka dirty fuel. It’s in a lot of clothing. And when you wash it, microplastics shed from the clothing and eventually get into our rivers, oceans and water systems. Avoid if possible!
GOOD :)
Good stuff is happening too! Usually there’s a big disconnect between brands and their suppliers, making it difficult to track impact and emissions. But, as an example, Levi Strauss helps their suppliers get low-interest loans for renewable energy and efficiency projects. It sounds like we’re pushing Levi’s, which we kind of are because it is important to note the brands that are changing their ways.
Things You Can Do:
Buy Recycled: look for stores that promote second hand, vintage, consignment or resale.
Buy Organic
Buy Hemp + Flax (Linen comes from Flax): They don’t need a lot of water, they can grow on soil that isn’t used for food production, and they actually improve soil health.
Don’t buy products with polyester.
Don’t buy! This is an opportunity to ask yourself that question: Will I need it tomorrow? Even the most sustainably created clothing requires energy and resources to produce.
This is only a glimpse at this industry, but overall it’s important to know that it’s growing—the fashion and clothing industries are on the rise along with their environmental impact. Conscious, circular decisions that you can make will help move it in the right direction. Take advantage of the fact that what you buy is up to you. If buying clothes has become habitual, remember that habits can be changed. Maybe you’ll even pick up sewing and close those holy jeans!
Artwork by Renny Engbring