‘What Happens Next?’: Is It Time to Rethink Our Wardrobes?

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.

News presenter 1: There has been another horrific incident at a garment factory in Bangladesh. An eight-storey building collapsed today, killing at least 145 people and injuring hundreds of others.

News presenter 2: It was the worst industrial disaster in Bangladesh's history. Rana Plaza today...

News presenter 3: A giant plaza with a market and several clothing factories inside. During morning rush hour, it simply collapsed.

Dr Susan Carland: In late April 2013, cracks began appearing in the pillars, floors and walls of the eight story Rana Plaza building in Bangladesh's Dhaka District. The building was evacuated and some of the businesses occupying the lower floors closed until it could be properly inspected.

Around 9am on April 24, the building collapsed, trapping thousands of workers, mostly women, in the rubble. More than 1,130 people died in what would ultimately become the deadliest garment factory disaster in history.

News presenter 4: Bangladesh has one of the largest garment industries in the world, and it's notorious. Last fall, there was a deadly fire at a factory that produced clothes for Disney, Walmart and Sears.

Dr Susan Carland: In the fallout, riots broke out in Bangladesh, and the rest of the world woke up. It was time for revolution in the fashion industry.

Janice Breen Burns: Such a tragic event, and so many hundreds of people died. And it immediately focused our global attention on the process of making fashion, how it's accelerated beyond compassion, beyond kindness, beyond the craft. The reason for fashion in the first place.

Dr Susan Carland: That's Janice Breen Burns, who's worked as a fashion writer and editor for about 30 years. She says that while the Rana Plaza disaster opened a lot of people's eyes to issues with the supply chain – specifically, who's making our clothes and what their living conditions are like – change was already in the air.

Janice Breen Burns: That was one trigger. But I also think it's part of the zeitgeist. Everybody's thinking about climate change, transparent supply chains, where their food comes from, where their clothes come from, where their chairs and tables come from. We all want to take a responsible approach to the way we live our lives and what we consume.

Aleasha McCallion: We've got a hundred billion garments being produced every year globally, and they're being completely underused. Julie Boulton: And they're being worn – like, they're not even being worn properly.

Dr Susan Carland: Aleasha McCallion and Julie Boulton work at the Monash University Sustainable Development Institute, where one of their projects takes an interdisciplinary approach to tackling the textile waste crisis – and it is a crisis. Here's Julie.

Julie Boulton: We're buying at a rate that is not sustainable for our planet. And we're consuming at a rate that is not going to last long term. It's not going to have any good outcomes for anyone. We're not thinking about what we're producing. We're not thinking about what we are consuming.

I mean, when you stop and think about the resources that have gone into making our clothing, making what it is we wear, and if you really think about all the steps along the chain – so how the fibre was run in the first place, how it was turned into fabric, where it came from, the people involved, where it was then shipped to and turned into a t-shirt, how it came to the store… You end up buying it, and then if you only wear it once or twice, and then you go out and buy the next colour, or the next t-shirt, or the next style, it's not great. It's not great for our planet.

Just in terms of success though, this is the other thing that worries me and keeps me up at night. The fact that success for brands, for anyone, is seen in terms of more. So you sell more and more t-shirts, you're seeing as an all-successful brand you've got more profit, and that's a good thing. We're not seeing success as quality, looking after the planet, making sure we've produced thoughtfully.

Dr Susan Carland: Julie, what do you think he's driving this desire for constant acquisition of more clothes, more clothes, more clothes.

Julie Boulton: Man. There's a lot of different things I think that are driving it. And I don't think it's just clothes. I think it can be related to all aspects of our lifestyles.

Like we know in Australia, our houses are getting bigger and bigger, and they have been for a number of years now. Our wardrobe is getting bigger and bigger. Food waste, so the amount of food we're buying and churning through, that's another issue.

So I think there's a whole lot of issues at play here. It's not just on clothing.

And then what's driving it. Maybe, and this is just a guess – I don't think enough research has been done on all of the drivers behind fast consumption production, but maybe we've lost our way a little bit.

If I had to think of something I would think... And this is something I saw about 10 years ago that really got me interested in the issue. I lived in the Solomon Islands for a couple of years, and the Sols is an amazingly beautiful, beautiful place. Completely... It faces a lot of different challenges to what we face in Australia. And the challenges… I feel in the Sols, people are much more connected to where things come from, and there's a value placed on rubbish. It's not rubbish. It can be used a hundred times.

I think here we've had access and we've had such a good life, for a long time, where we've forgotten the cost, the real cost, the true cost of our products and everything that we have. And so I think we need to stop, and we need to reconnect, and we need to remember that everything comes from somewhere.

Dr Susan Carland: Our ability to purchase trendy clothes. We only wear once or twice is thanks in part to fast fashion, which isn't as new a concept as you might have thought. Dr Eloise Zoppos, an applied researcher at the Australian Consumer and Retail Studies Unit at Monash University, explains. Where did the term, or where did the idea of, fast fashion come from?

Dr Eloise Zoppos: Well, fast fashion refers to the designing, manufacturing and marketing of inexpensively and rapidly produced clothing, largely in response to catwalk and consumer trends.

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And, examples of fast fashion retailers include H&M, Topshop, Zara. So people often think fast fashion is a relatively new or modern phenomenon. But actually, if you look at the history of fast fashion, or at least the history of the idea of fast fashion, it can be traced back to as early as the 1800s. So prior to that time, clothing production was manual, it was made to order. So you had to order a particular style or your particular size.

But with the industrial revolution and the development of technologies like the sewing machine up to large scale factories, for example, clothing became quicker, easier, cheaper to produce. So the cycle of fashion really started to pick up speed as people didn't have to put in a select order for a certain size, for example.

And when you think about a fast-fashion retailer like H&M, although they picked up popularity in the 1990s and 2000s, their first store opened in the 1940s. So the idea of fast fashion has actually been around for quite a while, but really just started to be referred to as the term ‘fast fashion’ when these types of retailers opened globally in the 1990s and 2000s, and started selling online.

Dr Susan Carland: In recent years, fast fashion’s developed a bad reputation for poorly made garments, environmentally unfriendly practices at a high human toll, which we saw at Rana Plaza. Then there’s greenwashing.

Dr Eloise Zoppos: Greenwashing is the practice of a company making exaggerated or misleading marketing claims around their environmental practices. So for example, it would be a company setting a great-sounding sustainability target for 2030, but not actually being transparent about what that target means or how they're actually going to achieve it.

And that points to one of the reasons why greenwashing can be incredibly complex for consumers, because it's really hard sometimes for the average consumer to work out what a company means when they say these great claims. And there's also no one monitoring or regulating these claims, there's no governance around it. So it can be hard sometimes for the average consumer to really understand and really see through greenwashing.

Dr Susan Carland: Here's Aleasha McCallion.

Aleasha McCallion: So Susan, greenwashing is really about conveying a false impression right at the core of it. And it's a very blurry kind of area because it could be somewhat unintended. It can be partially true, but really it leaves most people just confused as to whether or not they're making the right decision when they purchase something.

Dr Susan Carland: It is really confusing, isn't it? I know I go into shops sometimes and I see tags that say things like, “this is from our sustainability line”. And I think, “I wonder what that means? And also, what does that mean for the rest of your clothes? If you've got this line, what's going on with the other clothes?”.

Aleasha McCallion: So, a quick example of greenwashing which I stumbled upon last week, I think, and I was sharing with Julie is, I purchased a second hand garment that happened to still have a tag on it. And it said it was 85 per cent ecologically grown cotton. And I thought, “Huh, that's interesting. I'm pretty much sure that cotton is ecologically grown, no matter what it is”, but it was actually just a phrase coined by that particular brand.

And when I did a little bit more digging... Although they’re working with certified standards like GOTS, which is the Global Organic Textile Standard, I think… and so, although they're working towards an organic standard, they're still labelling their clothing with “ecologically grown cotton”. Which is just a little bit suspect as far as whether or not that's partially true, or whether it's actually certified organic cotton. So again, not terrible, but not really crystal clear and often a little bit misleading.

Dr Susan Carland: In some ways, fast fashion is a good thing. If a $2 t-shirt means more money for things like food on the table, says Janice Breen Burns, that's okay. But for many consumers, fast fashion means cheap thrills.

Janice Breen Burns: We're slowing down fast fashion by being responsible consumers, but there's still this residue of people, residue of markets, that can put that aside.

And this is the work that we still have to do as a fashion industry. We have to disconnect that cheap thrill you get from a cheap frock. We have to disconnect that sense of – well, it's a buzz – that little flicker, that little moment of satisfaction, or that little moment where you think that you can rise above your own reality and you'll be prettier, or you'll be cooler, or you'll be better if you buy this $30 frock, without actually sort of looking into how it got onto that rack.

We've got to disassociate that feeling from consumers, or that mechanic from consumers, and replace it with something that involves more of a narrative about fashion. Where fashion comes from, what the craft is, who is making it?

And those incredibly complicated supply chains have to be exposed so that you know, all the way along that supply chain, who is involved, how much they’re paid, how they live, and how they contributed to your piece of clothing.

And I think then, once we disconnect that buzz and replace it with a sense of satisfaction that you are buying something that is actually going to improve your life, but is also improving somebody else's life, I think that's how fashion is slowing down. Did I answer the question?

Dr Susan Carland: Yes. No, you did, you did. And it made me wonder if what ethical or slow fashion is trying to do… it's revealing that we have these two competing forces within us. On the one hand wanting to do good, wanting to be moral beings who benefit others as well as ourselves. And on the other hand, the competing, very strong desire to get the most for the least.

We've got these two competing desires within us, and ethical fashion is trying to push this one, the more moral choice to the front, and fast fashion is pushing the most for the least to the front. And there is a battle within us every time we purchase anything.

Janice Breen Burns: I wish I'd said that. That's a fantastic way of nut-shelling the whole problem with fast fashion.

Dr Susan Carland: New York City-based designer and Instagramer Nicole McLaughlin has taken up cycling to a whole new level. Go look at her Instagram account if you've never seen it, we've linked it in the show notes. Don't worry! We'll be here when you get back.

Nicole's designs are often created with sample products, crafted by designer, footwear and fashion brands, which would never otherwise see the light of day. She's not sure all the blame lies with fast fashion.

Is there any area of the fashion industry that you feel is still lagging their heels when it comes to sustainability and an ethical approach?

Nicole McLaughlin: Yes, I'd say higher fashion, for sure. I just feel like a lot of luxury brands, they're kind of behind on this. And it's really important for them to be able to lead and show an example because they are the pinnacle and the top of the fashion industry, and they probably have the most waste.

I don't want to call anybody out specifically, but when you hear about these stories about luxury brands throwing out perfectly fine leather bags that maybe have just a small scratch, or if a pattern was printed the wrong way, rolls and rolls of fabric are getting destroyed. And it's just really upsetting to see that. And especially when the price point is so high, I just feel like they should be doing a lot better.

Dr Susan Carland: It's interesting to hear you say that, because so often in these conversations about the waste of the fashion industry, people target fast fashion.

Nicole McLaughlin: Mhmm.

Dr Susan Carland: But it's interesting, you're saying, look, we really need to be looking at the top of the tree and what's happening there. That maybe that's not getting as much focus as it should be.

Nicole McLaughlin: Yeah. I mean, fast fashion is definitely like… that's a huge culprit in all of this. And I think that's a lot of the demand that we've, as consumers, created as well. And I don't put the blame on the consumers ever, but I do feel like if there wasn't as much overconsumption, they wouldn't have a target audience. So I'd say the smaller and more fast fashion brands are referencing these higher fashion brands, and they should be setting a better example.

Dr Susan Carland: Mmm.

Aleasha, I want you to cast your mind 50 years into the future. Imagine we, in Australia and the world, don't change the way we think about fast fashion, and we keep consuming fashion in the way that we are. What does the world look like?

Aleasha McCallion: Oh, it's pretty catastrophic, to be honest, in my mind. I think, as Julie mentioned, we're talking about resources and limited resources. So if we think about the fact that they are going to continue to be, and over the course of the next 50 years become more and more, I guess, finite, it's about limiting what we have access to, and the costs are going to increase. For me, we're in this overdrive extreme pressure system. And so that will break.

We saw this play out a little bit when we think about, or quite a lot, actually, when we think about the impacts of COVID. So that's a real shock to the system. And what came from that was breaking down of the system, so supply chains just stopped. Brands were no longer able to pay for product, or chose not to pay for product. And those that are the most vulnerable feel the impact the hardest, those that are working on the front lines, garment workers who depend on their income to feed their families.

So for me, the 50 years in advance is where we see the system completely break down and it's no longer viable. And so any businesses are not transitioning now will not be in existence in 50 years because they will not be able to access materials, and they will not be able to produce at a reasonable price that anyone will be able to consume at. That's the catastrophic version.

If we don't change anything, how soon that's going to happen is actually, I think, something we really need to consider. Fifty years is probably not the length of time that we have at the pace that we're going. We simply have to slow down. We have no choice, because we're actually just chewing through resources, and human capital, and greenhouse gas emissions. We're chewing through all of that at such an expansive speed that we really have no choice. We don't have 50 years.

Dr Susan Carland: Is it possible to be an ethical consumer while still looking fabulous? And what can you and I do as individuals to make a dent in the larger fashion and textile waste crisis? Join us next week to find out.

Thanks to all our guests today: Janice Breen Burns, Nicole McLaughlin, Aleasha McCallion, Julie Bolton, and Dr Eloise Zoppos. For more information about their research and work, visit the link in our show notes.

Thank you also to the Monash University Performing Arts Centre's David Li Sound Gallery, where a portion of this season was recorded. If you're enjoying What Happens Next?, don't forget to give us a five star rating on Apple Podcast or Spotify, and share the show with your friends.

Thanks for joining us. See you next week!