Our addiction to cheap clothes is a bad look – for us and the planet

Do you have one special item parked in a corner of your wardrobe that invokes stirring memories of prior wears every time you glance upon it? A beloved dress, perhaps, or pair of tailored trousers that, while you know you never quite wear them enough, have never lost their ability to save the sartorial day?

I don’t. Not because my wardrobe isn’t heaving – in fact it tilts forward at an angle that is deeply concerning – but because our 21st-century attitude to clothes (buy ’em cheap, and then buy more, even cheaper) is totally at odds with cultivating any kind of collection that matters.

This throwaway culture is now at such a level that it is harming the planet, the Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) has warned MPS; Brits buy twice as many new clothes as we did a decade ago – some 27kg, or 60lb, of cheap chaff each year. And I am firmly among those guilty of fast fashion, today sporting trews that are less than 24 hours old, purchased merely due to having wandered past a shop and been taken in by a sale sign. I didn’t even try them on.

I wish I could say this was an infrequent occurrence. But, in truth, it happens multiple times a week – something sure to send chills down the spines of previous generations, who saved up for key pieces they knew would last a lifetime and have proudly clung on to them ever since.

But the concept of things being passed down over the years – or even lasting a full year – has become obsolete. From the lower to higher ends of high street stores, options are in abundance but quality is not; everything is made cheaply, there to cater to passing fancies, rather than built for the long haul. And so, as with many other unhealthy habits, we Brits now tower over our European counterparts for being the worst offenders of this endless consumption, which the EAC puts down to our love of online shopping and obsession with social media sites, where a bottomless array of newer, glitzier things awaits.

This is unsustainable, clearly – even for those of us, like me, who don’t shop online or buy things advertised on Instagram. This is true environmentally (ripped jeans, the current fad, take more energy to make than those that haven’t been slashed), economically (yes, they’re cheap, but endless purchases do add up) and spatially, with these “steals” falling apart at such a rate, they’re not even fit for donation after minimal wear.

Who is to blame for this exhausting hamster wheel of buying, clearing out and buying anew? There are always going to be endless shelves full of temptations, of new-wardrobe, new-you promises; it’s for shoppers to self-regulate, rather than lambast businesses for capitalising on our hedonism. But until shops return to selling clothes with the longevity to match a costlier price tag, our wardrobes will groan ever louder at our extravagance. It’s just a shame we’ll have nothing to show for it.