Addressing the issues of fashion
NEXT time you put on your best jeans to go and march against climate charge, think again. It appears that the manufacture of denim jeans is one of the most environmentally damaging processes in the clothing trade – in many ways that old polyester jumpsuit could be a more sustainable option.
Dressing sustainably is a complex issue and it’s one Jennifer Whitty addresses on a daily basis, as a senior lecturer at Massey University.
The School of Design is part of Massey’s College of Creative Art, one of five colleges, and takes on around 250 students a year. Whitty is in the fashion department but has found herself more and more teaching across other design programmes – which is good as interdisciplinary design is a key interest.
Whitty moved to New Zealand from Ireland with her partner to take up the Massey job, but she’s no stranger here.
‘‘It’s actually my second time living in New Zealand,’’ she says. ‘‘We lived here as a family when I was a teenager in the 90s.’’
So when the chance to return for work came up, she jumped at it, and not just for the lifestyle quality.
‘‘In the academic sphere in Ireland there are limited options in art and design to actually be a practice-led researcher,’’ Whitty says. ‘‘My role at Massey enables me to be a practitioner, teacher and a researcher and it’s hard to get that balance and that mix of things in academia’’
In Ireland, Whitty attended Art and Design School – (a highly competitive Irish tertiary system for specialising in fine arts and design) – where in her first year as part of the programme of study she had to take all six subjects on offer across art and design.
‘‘And as soon as I did fashion it absolutely clicked,’’ she says. ‘‘My friends at the time said something came over me – I was working till 3 or 4am, like a Duracell bunny. And it seemed like the place I could marry my interests in conceptual thinking and 3D realisation.’’
Whitty says that as a child she was creative and interested in a wide range of subjects.
‘‘I was really curious, enjoyed science, creating new knowledge and exploring ideas. My mum is a painter and my father is an aeronautical engineer, so art and design seemed like the place to satisfy my creative impulses.’’
There’s more to fashion than models on runways, she says, and sustainable fashion is an especially complex subject.
‘‘We’re looking beyond the product itself and not just the manufacture but also the use, and the consumer’s responsibility with the products they have.’’
One of Whitty’s projects involves upcycling – taking waste clothing and repurposing it in a new sustainable system.
‘‘We’re looking at production methods that pose alternatives to the status quo and the way things are made currently, and we’re just as interested in kind of consumers’ behaviour, so it’s fashion in its broadest terms, as a service, as a system and as a product.’’
Current consumer perceptions about what’s good for the environment and what isn’t are not necessarily correct. The fashion and textile industry is the second most polluting on the planet, she says. Very little dye actually makes it into into textiles, for example, with most going into the waterways.
She says virgin/non-organic cotton is arguably the most damaging crop of all.
‘‘It’s probably the worst thing to have something made out of because it’s the most water-intensive crop, and creates lack of diversity in farming areas,’’ she says. ‘‘Jeans from non-sustainable suppliers are almost about the most environmentally damaging garments there are.
‘‘We’ve been very good at creating very efficient systems. But we’ve only acknowledge the financial or manufacturing capital, not the social capital or the environmental capital, or the impacts,’’ Whitty says.
‘‘As a fashion researcher and lecturer, I think it’s really reckless to ignore these kind of issues, so I’ve devoted my practise to looking at how we can make the fashion system better.’’
That doesn’t mean going full-Stalinist with everyone clad in utilitarian olive-drab onesies though.
‘‘Fashion is part of being a human – and I don’t think we can necessarily suppress that,’’ Whitty says.
‘‘I think that’s really interesting from a Western perspective on fashion, because in many non-western cultures, fashion is not just about status – it has a very different connotation, it’s celebrated as being an innate part of how you express yourself. So I think we have a lot of work to do in the West.’’ It’s not going to be a quick fix, she says. ‘‘Sustainability is a combination of factors – the raw materials, the human labour and the use phase.’’
It’s been said that the most sustainable garment is the one you already own, so that old jumpsuit could put you ahead on a number of counts.
‘‘We’ve got to look at how often we wash clothes as well, and you could have a polyester garment that you’re taking better care of and you’re keeping for longer, so that could be arguably more sustainable.’’
Whitty’s team produces a clothing range as part of the Space Between project.
‘‘People can purchase on line, with drop down menus so they can see exactly where everything was made, how long it took to make and why it is the price it is,’’ she explains. ‘‘If you know why a garment is priced that way, you can be more discerning in your purchasing.’’
Whitty says she is impressed by a number of fashion designers.
‘‘Aesthetically I like what Gucci are doing – I think it’s brave and fearless, with heart and soul, but they are out of my price range and I haven’t fully investigated all of their practices as the luxury sector is often very opaque.
‘‘And Japanese designers like Issey Miyake are probably the reason I came into fashion.
‘‘They really pushed our perception of what clothing could be, how it related to society – as a feminist, I liked how they were challenging the notion of how women should behave and how they should look and they were designing new forms that were kind of sculptural, driven by