SUSTAINABLE FASHION OR FASHIONABLE SUSTAINABILITY?

SUSTAINABLE FASHION OR FASHIONABLE SUSTAINABILITY?

Is there sustainability in fashion, or is just sustainability that’s in fashion? At any rate, there is hardly an environmental or societal ill that the fashion industry is not accused of causing. Its vast appetite for cotton leads to allegations of soil depletion and lack of biodiversity due to intensive farming, the chemical treatments that textiles go through are said to pollute our rivers, synthetic fibers are alleged to release micro-plastics into the ocean, while textile manufacturing is singled out for low-paid labour and hazardous working conditions. One way or another, fashion is routinely singled out for lack of sustainability. On the face of it, this is counterintuitive, if only because textile manufacturing is unique among all other industrial sectors in making products mainly from biodegradable raw materials, namely cotton and wool, in stark contrast to smartphone producers, for instance, who most certainly do not a biodegradable product make. Yet, few complain about the toxic chemicals embedded in our phones or seem to be bothered about what happens to them once they are discarded. Of course, even natural fibers undergo chemical treatments, beginning with colouring, but so does virtually anything else produced since the dawn of the 20 th century. And about the undesirable side- effects of intensive cotton farming, they are exactly the same as those caused by intensive vegetable farming, yet many of the very people who point their fingers at non-organic cotton are quite happy to chomp on intensively farmed non-organic salad.

How did fashion become fast?

What is it, then, that triggers such strong feelings about the fashion industry? Most likely, it’s the wastefulness of “fast-fashion”. Indeed, there is no intrinsic reason why fashion should be “fast”. However, while the ills of the fast fashion industry are routinely laid at the door of consumers, it is not they who invented this business model. To the contrary, consumers are the first to suffer from the short lifespan of cheaply-made clothing. Nobody has an interest in seeing their clothes self-destruct every few weeks or months. In other words, fast fashion is an answer to a question nobody was asking.

Yet, we are seeing more and more if it. Why?

The reason seems to lie in low prices. But how low are they really? This is where it gets interesting. They are not very low, in reality. Nowadays, even in inflation-adjusted terms, the price of cheaply made fast-fashion garments that will last no longer than three washes and two drying cycles is hardly lower than a decent, mid-market clothing item that lasts a lifetime back in the 1980s.

How did it come to this?

The reason for this deterioration in purchasing power goes back to the Nineties when textile production started being outsourced from Europe to ever-cheaper overseas countries, while at the same time prices were hiked far in excess of inflation. The aim was to acquire customers in new markets where quality matters less than big logos and the illusion of exclusivity, even at the cost of alienating traditional customers back at home. As a result, having been left with nowhere to go, it’s no surprise that many of these formerly loyal customers turned to mass-market retailers. They can hardly be blamed for that, nor can those retailers be blamed for simply filling a void. What’s the alternative? Is it really the case that, when it comes to clothing, the majority of the population is being squeezed between an ever-loftier top and an ever-shabbier bottom of the market?

Rebirth, reluxury…revolution?

There is hope. First of all, in recent years, there has been an encouraging rebirth of independent manufacturers that combine a focus on quality with prices that reflect the intrinsic value of their products. Switzerland, for instance, boasts more and more artisanal clothing manufacturers that offer vastly superior value – and style – for money over a lifetime than the top or the bottom of the market ever will. True to form, the ever so linguistically creative Japanese have even coined a term for this concept, namely “cospa” (コスパ), short for ‘cost performance’, to indicate the ratio of purchase price in relation to the product’s lifespan.

Another notable development of the past decade is the boom in the upmarket second-hand trade, both online and offline. The significance of this trend can hardly be overstated. Looking at what’s happening in the watch industry, I wouldn’t be surprised if one day the main fashion brands started taking back second-hand clothes in order to sell them on themselves, like car dealers. Finally, repairing damaged clothes is back in fashion, too. There is even a new term for it, “Re-Luxury”. However, there is a caveat: it only works for clothes that have been produced according to a certain quality standard. As a rule of thumb, those that are glued together instead of being sewn, be it shirts, handbags, shoes, or dresses, are hard to mend.

Is lack of quality sustainable?

In conclusion, the most sustainably thing to do in fashion is to take an interest in quality. An item with a certain quality is inevitably going to be worn more often, will be looked after more carefully, and will be kept in the wardrobe for longer than a comparable item of lower quality. This, on its own, already goes a long way towards increasing a garment’s sustainability, even before taking into account that the production of high-quality clothing is incomparably less polluting than that of cheaply made textiles.

Moreover, producing quality requires skilled labour, which not only forces employers to invest in training, but also leads to higher wages for textile workers. Admittedly, recognizing quality can be tricky to pull off. Yet, this shouldn’t stop anyone from trying, especially those who profess their discontent with the status quo, for it is only when the demand changes that the supply will adapt.

ENRICO BORGER - Financial Writer & Investstment Specialist