CAN HIGH STREET FASHION EVER BE ETHICAL?
With more brands launching conscious ranges, two writers have their say
Do I believe that the fashion industry – embarrassingly, known to be in the top five of all polluting industries on earth – can be transformed into a green hero? Yes I do. I’m an optimist. But do I believe that high-street brands built on the fast-fashion system of rapid production in low-wage economies will spearhead that change? Don’t make me laugh.
The fast-fashion business model is based entirely on speed and growth. The major players open hundreds of stores globally each year. Market share is everything. Slow down and they die. My research suggests that 80bn to 100bn new garments are created each year, and this is growing. The effect of this on the planet is catastrophic. The fast-fashion model is powered by two cheap, very old-fashioned fibres: cotton and polyester. Both use extraordinary amounts of water and chemicals.
Fortunately, we’re in the midst of a wake-up call. Start-ups brewing spider silk and bio-fabricating cow-free leather in laboratories are fusing fashion and science. This sits alongside other disruptive innovation including 3D-printed clothes, which in effect designs out waste. But this brave new world takes millions of dollars of investment, and that is coming largely from luxury conglomerates.
Tricky territory. Luxury has plenty of supply chain skeletons too, but this revolution will come down to pragmatic rather than moral judgements. Who has an adaptable business model that can invest in disruption at a level that we’ve seen in technology or media? This level of innovation needs patience and capital to shift the whole fashion system.
‘Fast fashion’, that loaded label for consumerism at its most greedy, is one of the biggest challenges to sustainability. Too-cheap clothing comes with an astronomical environmental and human cost – if you spend £7 on a pair of jeans, someone or something has suffered to make it (2013’s tragic Rana Plaza disaster must never happen again).
But this isn’t a high end = good, high street = bad issue. There’s a positive shift among affordable brands. Zara offers in-store recycling points, ARKET uses recycled cashmere, ASOS publishes a sourcing map and even Primark, previously the posterbrand for buy-it-bin-it fashion, introduced sustainable cotton pyjamas this year.
In the past, ethical clothing has had an image problem. Now it’s cool – thanks to the likes of H&M’S Conscious collection, Mango’s Committed line and ethical LA fave Reformation: clothes you want to wear. They’re the death knell for the hemp smock.
The high street’s manufacturing practices are nowhere near perfect, but there’s progress – we need to congratulate trying. The sooner we surround the sustainability issue with positive language, the better. And we need the high street on-board with this debate; without it, how will we ever achieve meaningful change?
We can all be the agents of change, we just have to shop more mindfully. Make Vivienne Westwood’s call to arms, ‘ buy less, choose well, make it last’, your mantra – it’s far more satisfying than another thing you don’t need.