Fast fashion generally refers to clothing that is designed and turned around quickly, usually inspired by the catwalk, and made to reflect current trends. Often inexpensive, and highly disposable, fast fashion is responsible for water pollution and textile waste – among other issues, including low paid labor.
Vanita Bagri is the Founder and CEO of LaBante London, a vegan-certified brand producing luxury handbags and sunglasses. She said: “Is fast fashion ethical?
“You see websites selling dresses for £5. You need to ask yourself the question, if something costs so little money, has somebody paid the price when that outfit was made?
“Absolutely somebody did. Someone down the line did. We didn’t because we bought the outfit for £5, but what about person who made it? When you start thinking about how these amounts break down, it makes you think about the labor behind the pieces.”
Textile waste is a major environmental issue when it comes to fast fashion. According to Bagri, manufacturers always overproduce, meaning there is often excess stock which needs to be burned. To get economies of scale, and ensure they don’t have out of stock situations, large manufacturers and brands tend to overproduce. Leftover clothes go into incinerators because if it’s the end of the season, and there is not enough display space left, clothes will be sent to burn. Both lower and upper scale brands do it. Burning leads to a lot of toxic pollution and waste, all that toxic smoke gets released into the atmosphere. This won’t impact us immediately but by the time the smog settles, this impacts our planet, our cities, and our rural areas because usually, that’s where the burning takes place which impacts wildlife as well as people.
What can we do?
Doing something significant ourselves to help resolve this issue can be time consuming and difficult; especially because we are so used to living such fast paced lives and the clothing we buy is a part of that. There are several brands that are doing a lot to ensure that their labourers are making fair wages, employees are not being mistreating in their factories, A few examples of brands going out of their way for these causes include Vanita Bagri’s brand LaBonte London. They have employed a chief ethics officer who is in charge of making sure that the company is run in the most ethical way possible.
Another part of it is trying to make slow fashion. This can mean making clothing items that have one-year long warranties for example, encouraging consumers to get their clothing items altered and fixed rather than tossing their clothes and buying new ones every few months. Companies can also start making more classic clothing that stays in fashion for a much longer period of time so customers never feel a need to stop wearing it because it went out of style. Brands such as Frankie Collective also have a good process where they take vintage clothing and re-purpose them by turning them into items that are currently in style. These can help save a lot of resources especially because styles tend to come and go every few years. As consumers, buying our items from brands like will encourage others to do the same which will in turn force other brands to become more conscious of their ethical ways as well.
Therefore, there is a lot we can do as consumers just as there is a lot companies need to start doing if we as a society want to start using fashion as a catalyst for social and environmental change; and it all starts with the reduction of fast fashion.
fashion & social change 