‘What Happens Next?’: Can We Put the Brakes on Fast Fashion?

Dr Susan Carland: Welcome back to What Happens Next?, the podcast that examines some of the biggest challenges facing our world and asks the experts, what will happen if we don't change? And what can we do to create a better future?

I'm Dr Susan Carland. Keep listening to find out what happens next.

Dr Eloise Zoppos: I think there's been a real shift lately on Instagram and social media in general, away from buying trends to actually buying more consciously and more mindfully.

Nicole McLaughlin: I think it's still good for us to have those conversations and I'd rather approach it in a more fun and lighthearted way.

Aleasha McCallion: Although the most sustainable garment is in your wardrobe already, fall in love with it again, revalue it, revalue the resources and the time and the energy that's gone into it. Think about repairing...

Dr Susan Carland: On today's episode, we'll wrap up our look at the fashion and textile industry's waste crisis, and find out whether or not we can be ethical consumers while still managing to look fabulous. If you haven't heard part 1 of the series, which came out last week, have a listen. Otherwise, stay tuned to find out what happens next.

During the COVID pandemic’s many, many lockdowns, a lot of us picked up new hobbies. Your Instagram feed was probably full of your friends' adventures in baking, gardening and fitness. New York-based fashion designer Nicole McLaughlin noticed another trend.

Have you seen an uptick in people who are at home and maybe thinking, “Well, I want to try this upcycling process”, or turning old or end-of-life items into something new?

Nicole McLaughlin: Yeah, for sure. It's making me so happy to see that, too, especially during all the quarantining that we've had, to see how many people use that time to get creative and to try things out. And I think it was a period where people felt actually more vulnerable and comfortable sharing things that maybe they wouldn't necessarily have shown the world.

But I think it's been really cool, especially in the world of Instagram and TikTok specifically, I see so many younger people who have learned to sew, who have picked up the sewing skill of using the machines or by hand or knitting. It's such a surge in what I'd say is a lost trade. Because I think the past couple generations learning how to sew wasn't really as popular as it was many generations ago.

So I definitely see a bigger moment of that right now, which is really inspiring.

Dr Susan Carland: Nicole's body of work includes things like slippers made from tennis balls, furniture made of old Gatorade bottles, and a suitcase made from runners. It's weird, but it's funny, and that's what makes it effective, she says.

And why do you think your take on sustainable fashion has struck such a chord with people? For anyone listening who hasn't, I really recommend you check out Nicole's Instagram – we'll link it in the show notes – because it is so creative and so clever. Why do you think people have taken to what you do?

Nicole McLaughlin: Yeah. Thank you. I think it's just the real relatability of it. I think that everyone sees the items that I'm using and can feel some type of connection to them. It's not anything that people aren't familiar with. It's usually like everyday household items that are just kind of spun in a different way.

And I just feel like it resonates because it does feel relatable and it almost puts a spin on sustainability that makes it feel more approachable than some of the other messaging and things that have been out there before, that feel so far away from people, especially that aren't in the fashion industry. If they're just trying to get involved or understand a little bit more, this almost feels like a better way to approach the subject.

And I always say having fun with fashion is a more approachable way, because if you can start a conversation around it in a lighthearted way, even though it's a serious subject, I think that, at least it's starting a conversation.

Dr Susan Carland: Well, that's what I was going to say, because I think your work is so fun and I think sustainable fashion and ethical fashion can be done very seriously and, “This is a serious topic that we need to be very concerned about”, which on the one hand, of course, is true, but that's quite heavy and people can feel a bit put off by that. And so you turning tennis balls into a mitt, or bread into a jacket is really fun and funny, and I think that lightness helps bring people in.

Nicole McLaughlin: Yeah, exactly. And that's what I hope to do. I'm not trying to make everybody a sustainability expert, but just so much to get them involved in the conversation, and make it seem like it doesn't have to be so scary.

I think sustainability in general, when people talk about it, it’s so gloomy and dark, and just thinking about the future, we all feel the weight and the responsibility to be able to make better choices and everything. But a lot of the time, those things are out of our hands as individuals and it comes down more to corporations and larger companies who are causing the issues of climate change. And so I think it's still good for us to have those conversations and I'd rather approach it in a more fun and lighthearted way, I think.

Dr Susan Carland: Nicole is just one of the social media influencers who are changing the way people think about sustainable fashion.

For all the consumerism and spending we see on our social media feeds, there's also a strong cohort of users who were modelling ethical behaviours, says Monash Business School's Dr Eloise Zoppos.

Dr Eloise Zoppos: I think Instagram does definitely drive what people buy. Influences are posting things all the time and people want to look like them, but I think there's been a real shift lately on Instagram and social media in general, away from buying trends to actually buying more consciously and more mindfully.

So a lot of trends that we're seeing on Instagram are actually influencers and people engaging in the circular economy, for example, and sharing their love for secondhand shopping as opposed to fast-fashion shopping.

So while we are seeing people wanting to keep up with celebrity trends on Instagram, we're also seeing people shopping with different reasons to keep up with people on Instagram, like buying ethically or buying secondhand, for example.

Dr Susan Carland: This aligns with a larger trend, says Eloise, a global rejection of the hustle culture, an idea we explored last season on What Happens Next?.

Dr Eloise Zoppos: What we're seeing is perhaps a push away from fast living in general, I would say.

So in the last 5 to 10 years, there's been a real hustle culture, a real culture around busyness, working nights, working weekends, commuting, always being on. And I think in the last 5 to 10 years, and even with the impact of COVID-19, people have really started to slow down their living.

And that's not just in relation to work, and family life, and sea changes, and tree changes, it's also about how people consume. So people are really starting to become more mindful of what they're buying. They're more conscious in what they're consuming, and that means people are more considered when it comes to how much fast fashion they're buying, for example.

So in the last 5 years, what's really interesting is that the luxury market has been booming. So people aren't necessarily buying less in general, but they might be diverting their spend away from buying heaps of fast-fashion items to perhaps diverting their spend to spending more and buying a more timeless piece, or a more high-quality piece that will last rather than fast fashion, fast fashion all the time.

Dr Susan Carland: And so how are we seeing not just brands, but perhaps whole sections of the industry responding to these demands? What are companies or sectors doing to make themselves more values aligned with their customers?

Dr Eloise Zoppos: Yeah, there's a number of strategies that companies and particularly retailers are using to appeal to these conscious consumers, or to appeal to people that want to consume mindfully.

So for example, one of the leaders in this space has to be Patagonia. I couldn't not talk about Patagonia with this type of question. So Patagonia, the outdoor goods brand, they have a number of initiatives in this space to appeal to a values-driven or conscious consumer.

So for example, they have a repair initiative where they actually educate consumers and teach them how to repair one of their items, from Patagonia or from elsewhere, to discourage them from purchasing an item to replace that damaged or worn item. They're teaching people how to repair it.

They also have a campaign recently called “Don't Buy This Jacket”, where as the campaign name suggests, they encouraged people to think about whether they actually needed that item before replacing it, for example, by repairing it through one of their educational videos.

So they're a company that's consistently scoring an A on the Baptist World Aid Ethical Fashion Report. So that's an annual report that assigns brands a grade every year based on ethical markers like traceability, or human rights, or sustainability. So they're doing great things because they're really making it quite personal in terms of getting people to work with their hands and fix a product rather than replace it.

But other retailers are doing this in different ways. So for example, the department store David Jones now has a rent-and-return initiative where people can rent a garment for an event and return it afterwards rather than buying one. They also have a luxury resale platform on their website, where people can buy secondhand items from the David Jones website. Other retailers are doing it with products. So for example, Adidas have recently created a sneaker that's made of 100 per cent recycled polyester. So there's a range of retailers engaging in different strategies to appeal to these consumers.

And what's really interesting is that if you think of a retailer, a fast fashion retailer, like H&M, you'd think that they probably wouldn't be appealing to these consumers that are trying to engage and consume mindfully and consciously. But what the fast fashion retailers are trying to do is appeal to these consumers with strategies built into their products, strategies built into their supply chain.

So H&M, for example, use renewable energy in part of their supply chain. They have recycling initiatives, and they actually also score an A in the Ethical Fashion Report, which kind of seems odd that a fast-fashion retailer can do well in a report like that. But fast-fashion retailers often have the size and scale to invest in these initiatives, so they're also trying to appeal to these consumers in new ways as well.

Dr Susan Carland: Of course, not every company makes repairing perfectly good products as easy as the Patagonias of the world. Here's Julie Boulton from the Monash University Sustainable Development Institute.

Julie, one of the struggles that I have, and this isn't with slow fashion, but it's with, I suppose, trying to reuse anything at all at the moment. I have two examples recently that have just really frustrated me. One is, I have some Pyrex containers. The lids disintegrated, and I thought, I'm not going to chuck out Pyrex containers and buy new ones, I'm just going to get some new lids. They were really difficult to find, and when I found them online, just getting the lids was more expensive than buying new ones.

And, the exercise bike we have at home broke and the belt broke, and I thought, “We're not going to get a new one, we’re going to get it repaired”, and getting it repaired is a million times more expensive than just buying a new one.

So it feels like we're in this frustrating middle point where there are people who do want to do the right thing, and recognise just throwing things out is a stupid waste of time and resources and all these terrible things, but it's like the industry has not yet come to the party. Where it is cheaper to buy new and throw away, than to repair or fix. What can we do about that, Julie?

Julie Boulton: I have a very similar frustration to you. I've struggled with a lot of things and I wish... Well, gosh. I wish I had like some little handy person, handy fairy, a little handy fairy running around my house, who can come in and tighten the screw and fix a few things. Yeah.

Look, I think a whole range of things can be done. I hope you guys have come across a concept, Repair Cafes, which I think are genius. I love Repair Cafes. And Repair Cafes also come with people who know how to sew. So it's a concept that was started – I'm pretty sure it was started – in the Netherlands and it's spread to Australia. And it's a number of local groups who come together up here in Canberra. It's on a Saturday morning. You can book in ahead and say, “I'm bringing my exercise bike, can someone repair it? Does someone know how to repair it?” And there'll be people there tinkering away who'll be able to repair things, which is awesome, and it absolutely needs to happen.

And I think more and more people are saying, “There's value in this product, it's silly to throw it out. Look at all of those things that are attached to it. So I want to get it repaired”.

If we look at clothing, then it's simple repairing things that can happen with clothing. It's learning how to put the button back on, fix it. Just because there's a rip in the t-shirt, it doesn’t mean it has to be thrown out. It could be fixed, or it could be mended, or it could be made a feature. Your jeans that have got too many rips in them when it's no longer trendy to have rips, well, turn them into shorts! Like it's...

And I think this is so exciting about fashion too. I think we're at this moment in time where people are really embracing this imagination concept and creativity concept, which for me is what fashion essentially is all about, creativity and fashion and expressing yourself, going to the secondhand stores and finding an outfit that you can make into your own by adding a patch on, or taking a patch off, or doing whatever it is. I think all of that is super-exciting and I'm super pumped to see this movement really taking off.

But then at the beginning stage, I think there's a lot of work that is being done in the industry where people are designing for longevity. So actually designing a t-shirt, or a jumper, or a jacket that is designed to last and then offering repair services and repair kits. So you can buy clothes now without actually on-sell you, or as part of buying the product, they'll sell you a little repair kit, or you can download instructions on how to repair.

Patagonia, over the summer in the States, will go to all of the major camping grounds with a little van and offer a repair service for people with their jackets, free of charge. “Don't throw your jacket out, come to us, we'll repair it and it can keep going for another 20 years”. And that's ace, right? That's what we want to have happen. Because the more we can use what we already have, the less we are putting into our landfills, the less we are getting rid of just because we want to get rid of it because it's not quite right, the better our world will be.

Dr Susan Carland: Julie and her colleague at MSDI, Aleasha McCallion, emphasised that it's not enough to think about the landfall at the end of the garment's life cycle. Changes need to be made at every step of the process.

Julie Boulton: One thing we've been really conscious about, talking about is that waste it's the end, right? If we want to get rid of waste, we actually need to start back at the beginning, and we need to look at how we're designing the products, and we need to focus on, again, that entire chain. So how we design, how much we manufacture, where it's come from, how we're wearing it, how we use it, how it gets to second use and reuse. Then ultimately what happens when we waste, because at the moment... And then what happens with the waste also in terms of recycling, like are there systems in place, are there places in Australia that exist where we can actually take the textile, break it back down again into its fibre parts and then turn it into a new textile?

And there's not enough of that happening. It's starting to happen and it's awesome and we need that to happen more and more so we can deal with the waste and it's not just waste. It actually becomes… back into that circle. And that's... I guess it's a really complicated answer of saying, focusing on a circular economy, focusing on textiles becoming a circular product where there is no waste. So there is no away. We have to get that into our mindset, that there should no longer be any waste.

Dr Susan Carland: What can an individual do, Aleasha, if you love fashion, you want to keep looking trendy, what do you do?

Aleasha McCallion: Yeah, it's a great question. It's a great question for ourselves to reflect on, and I think you always want to just start from where you are.

There's a phrase that like, the most sustainable garment is the one that's already in your wardrobe. You already have it. It's already made, the resources have been invested, so cherish it and value it. Although the most sustainable garment is in your wardrobe already, fall in love with it again, revalue it, revalue the resources and the time and the energy that's gone into it. Think about repairing it before you discard it.

And also just when you're evaluating your textiles, think about your food intake. Think about the other things that you're conscious of. If you're trying to reduce your greenhouse gas emissions, then you can think about that as far as your clothing, as well as your food.

So for example, I always say, or recently coined the idea that you don't take a bite out of an apple, and then just toss the apple in a pile. That's just not acceptable. Right? We understand that fundamentally as waste, and so why would we wear one outfit, or an outfit one time, and then just toss it and be tired of it?

But at the end of the day, considering having secondhand in the mix, considering having… just less. Thinking about having only maybe two pairs of denim, instead of 16. Just questioning how much you need, and how much you're willing to consume, and also then what can you do with it when you are finished? Is there a really great way to donate? We have a really amazing scaled system in Australia to re-circulate all of these amazing goods, but if we drop them off in a manner that's not really ready for use for someone else, it's not in good shape, then that's actually just perpetuating the problem.

So being mindful about caring for that garment, mending it using it till its fullest. There's a hashtag, #WearItOut, really simple. And then when you do go to donate it and pass it on, do that in a way that's also mindful. So make sure it's freshly laundered, it's folded, it's ready to go into the donation collection with respect, and ready for someone else to purchase and use it.

So I think individuals can just start from where they are and take a few steps to be more conscious about their choices and the impacts of them. And I think a way to do that is just be kind to yourself and take a few steps.

Dr Susan Carland: Nicole thinks we can all be a little kinder to the brands that are taking their own small steps, too.

Nicole McLaughlin: There's a lot of things that happen behind the scenes that we don't know about, and a lot of the time brands don't always advertise all the things they're doing from a sustainability standpoint.

And it's a bummer because I think people would want to see that. But as soon as they say like, “Oh, we're pushing to be... like getting all recycled packaging or something”, then they almost feel like they have to really own up to that. And so I almost feel like brands shy away from that.

Dr Susan Carland: It's interesting when you say that, it made me wonder, in the same way as individual consumers, we sort of tell each other you don't have to be perfect. Just make this one change. Start checking the labels, buy secondhand more, reuse, etcetera, and work your way up to being a more ethical consumer.

I wonder if perhaps we need to extend the same grace to brands as well and say, okay, it's great that you've got recyclable packaging. We're not going to then be like, “But what about this? And what about that?” Start with that, and then improve on that, and keep stepping towards that. I wonder if our adamance that everyone needs to be perfect immediately and all the time might actually stop people from trying at all.

Nicole McLaughlin: Yeah, I totally agree. And that's something I definitely talk a lot about with my friends and consumers in general, just because people always put so much pressure on these really large companies that have been doing something a certain way for a really long time. Like some companies are 50 years old, and for them to go and completely change their business practices – I mean, I think it's important if they haven't started doing it. It's like, what are you doing, at this point?

But I'd say we have to be able to kind of give them a little bit of space, give them a little bit of breathing room, and show us what you're doing. Really show us your pathway forward. Be transparent in that way. And when there is something that we like from a brand that's actually working on sustainable stuff, tell them that you like it. Really understand that they're doing their best, and see how it goes before you judge them, I'd say.

Dr Susan Carland: Longtime fashion journalist and editor Janice Breen Burns is hopeful about the future.

Janice Breen Burns: We imbue fashion with so many values that it doesn't have. It can't raise us, give us that buzz and raise us beyond our own reality. It can't make us cooler. It can't make us prettier. It can't do all that. But it can make us feel really, really good about ourselves. If we are careful about what we buy, it can make us look the best we could possibly look, and make the best possible impression.

And if we buy less of it, we’ll be plugged into this whole question in the world at the moment: What are you doing as a responsible citizen? What are you doing as a responsible consumer to preserve our environment, to make a better world? And that's the future of fashion.

Dr Susan Carland: This is our final What Happens Next? episode on sustainable fashion. Thanks to all our guests today: Janice Breen Burns, Nicole McLaughlin, Aleasha McCallion, Julie Boulton, and Dr Eloise Zoppos. We've also included links to a few of our guest's favourite resources for becoming a more ethical consumer.

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Thanks for joining us. See you next week with an all-new topic.