Sustainable clothing VS fast fashion

Do you know where your clothes were made and under what conditions?

130 billion items of clothing are manufactured worldwide every year, and the textile industry is doing everything it can to produce more and more at lower cost.

As a fashion designer, I can assure you that between materials, labor and transport, a 29.90 dress is impossible to make using ethically responsible production methods.

So how does the fashion industry manage to charge such ridiculously low prices?

Firstly, the materials used are often of poor quality; fabrics warp in the wash and wear out in a very short time. Of course, cheaper means lower quality. Secondly, inexpensive clothing is mass-produced in thousands of items, with no attention to detail. Who hasn't bought a garment with a shoddy finish and seams that fall apart after the first wash? These garments have a very limited lifespan, and are immediately replaced by the next trend.

As an example of cheap fabrics, I can give you just one. When I was in London for my master's degree in fashion design, a colleague of mine bought some scuba fabric in London and also had some imported from China. The price of the fabric from China was 15 times lower, but the quality was very poor. What's more, it was uncomfortable and felt like plastic.

The fashion industry is doing everything it can to keep manufacturing costs down. They therefore relocate their production to countries with cheap labor, enabling them to pay derisory wages. Low wages also mean deplorable working conditions for the workers. Add to this the dilapidated buildings in which the workers toil. The most recent disaster was the collapse of a textile factory in Bangladesh, which left several dead and thousands injured (Rana Plaza).

As a consumer, you have the choice! 

More and more Swiss people are paying attention to where their food comes from. We saw this during the "Supermarket-Free February 2018" challenge, during which consumers favored local merchants. As with our food, everyone has a role to play in gradually changing the fashion industry. Favoring Swiss or European brands or designers for their values, know-how and the quality of their clothes is already a step towards ethically responsible fashion.