{"id":7515,"date":"2021-09-17T11:42:15","date_gmt":"2021-09-17T03:42:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/?p=7515"},"modified":"2021-09-17T11:42:17","modified_gmt":"2021-09-17T03:42:17","slug":"everyone-can-help-create-a-world-of-more-sustainable-fashion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/everyone-can-help-create-a-world-of-more-sustainable-fashion\/","title":{"rendered":"Everyone can help create a world of more sustainable fashion"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Repairing clothes, buying second hand, purchasing direct from the maker, reading labels, lobbying for change via social media platforms and not being a slave to trends are all actions individuals can take to encourage a new, more ethical order of fashion says a QUT researcher.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Around 100 million tonnes of fibre is produced each year and some 92 million tonnes of textile waste are discarded in the same period, an unsustainable situation in which everyone participates whether dressed in PPEs, tracksuit pants, uniforms, skinny jeans, designer dresses, or smart suits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Associate Professor Alice Payne says even small changes from individuals, paired with larger scale industry and policy measures could help make the current system \u2018less bad\u2019 for the environment and workers within it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Some of the inspiring examples of changes she cites include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>\u2018Taming waste\u2019 using advanced remanufacturing and other measures to recycle fast fashion fibres<\/li><li>Innovation in biotextiles and other renewable materials to move away from the heavy reliance on non-renewable polyester<\/li><li>Approaches to better connect everyone in the system, from fibre manufacturers, retailers, wearers to charities and recyclers<\/li><li>Growing consumer behavioural change: how people are sharing, swapping, and finding alternative ways to engage in fashion beyond industry dictates, including inventive approaches to repair<\/li><li>Initiatives around the world fighting to improve worker welfare<\/li><li>Manufacturers\u2019 innovation in better management of chemical inputs and wastewater, and<\/li><li>The opportunities presented through traceability technologies that can powerfully connect everyone throughout fashion\u2019s complex supply chains<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201c\u2018Sustainable fashion\u2019 may be defined as systems of clothing production and use that are environmentally responsible, contribute to the social wellbeing of workers and the wider community, and are based on values of cultural respect,\u201d said Associate Professor Payne who has a new book on the subject &#8211;&nbsp;<em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomsbury.com\/uk\/designing-fashions-future-9781350092464\">Designing Fashion\u2019s Future: Present Practice and Tactics for Sustainable Change<\/a><\/em>&nbsp;(Bloomsbury).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWhat is considered design in fashion is trivialised, feminised or brought into the rarefied world of art and serves to disguise how design in fashion actually functions. Exalted high end designers such as Chanel or McQueen represent only the tiniest portion of design practice in fashion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cMy book is not about them. Instead, I have sought to understand the design processes and practices of those who create everyday items like socks and t-shirts, as well as the many other decision-makers who help bring into being these humble objects. These people and their design processes clothe the world from cradle to grave, and their practices design fashion\u2019s future.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Associate Professor Payne sees the dominant form of fashion system as composed of four networks of production, promotion, wearing and destruction, all of which are out of sync with one another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIn the dominant system, fashion\u2019s industry and culture are bound up with an unsustainable pace of change, provoking the continual creation and destruction of new garments and the continual piquing of desire without satiation,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cA \u2018better\u2019 fashion system is certainly possible, but everyone needs to take some responsibility \u2013 if you wear clothes, you are part of it. In the past decade fashion sustainability \u2018awareness\u2019 has risen exponentially but so has pollution, waste, and overconsumption.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>By digging into the root causes of fashion\u2019s unsustainability, Associate Professor Payne proposes the imperfect but essential actions to take for change, and how these can be defined for an individual \u2013 whether designer, brand owner or everyday wearer \u2013 as their own \u2018ethical action space\u2019.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe book is not \u2018optimistic\u2019. Nor does it claim \u2018sustainability\u2019 is ever possible. Amid climate crisis and growing inequality, we may see few reasons to be optimistic. Rather, a way through the doom is to reject vague optimism and embrace hope, which can be expressed through actions,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThink about the issues that matter to you \u2013 whether biodiversity, justice for workers, tackling climate change, poverty, and that can become your ethical action space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIn the short-term, it\u2019s about seeking to make things better in the immediate and near future, within the scope of one\u2019s own ethical action space. For me that includes working with colleagues, community, and industry partners in finding the new processes and technologies to re-evaluate waste, here in Australia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cA long-term agenda for fashion\u2019s designers is to prepare our organisations, firms, communities in which we work for a resource-constrained future, one that is cleaner and lower-carbon through necessity, yet one in which economies and communities may be struggling to adapt. Fashion as culture, expressive of community and identity, will find new ways to flourish within these limits.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sustainable fashion is not just a concern for high end designers &#8211; we can all make a difference by the choices we make.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7516,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[563,2241,1595,2208,2223,150],"class_list":["post-7515","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beauty-and-fashion","tag-fashion","tag-fashion-goods","tag-fashion-no-no","tag-fashion-tips","tag-fashion-trends","tag-green-fashion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7515"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7515\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7517,"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7515\/revisions\/7517"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7516"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}