Fashion in Today's Political Climate

The political climate dictated the suit President George Washington wore to his first Inauguration. Rather than fabric imported from England, his three-piece brown suit was made of woolen broadcloth woven in the new United States. Centuries later, Dior marked the end of rationing after World War II by using yards and yards of fabric in his long, voluminous skirts.

     In today's political climate, a wide variety of elements cause heightened global concern for fashion's marketers and consumers. They are expected to pay attention to their social and environmental responsibilities. Among these concerns are: employment of marginalized workers at fair wages, working conditions, landfill waste, water consumption and chemical contamination, air pollution, energy usage, and animal welfare. To deal with these concerns, brands are developing standards they expect members of their supply chains to meet. Standards might require the use of:

• Fair labor practices outlined by the International Labour Organization
• NO restricted chemical substances, such as sunscreens that contain the oxybenzone that harms coral reefs; and NO animal fur or exotic leather
• Organic cotton and recycled materials
• Humane methods for obtaining down, fur, and wool
• Resource-conserving farming and manufacturing practices in terms of water, energy, and chemical usage

Suppliers that fail to meet supply chain standards are not used. Of course, standards are meaningless unless companies empower inspectors to monitor and confirm compliance. Also, bad publicity for any supplier in a chain reflects poorly on the final product and a consumer's willingness to buy it.

     How do consumers know if the products they purchase conform to the standards they support? Besides seeing good and bad publicity, advertising, sales promotion offers, and reviews by other consumers, shoppers check labels for such things as the percentage of recycled material used, faux fur, and which countries they prefer to make their clothes. They notice if marketers give back to the community in service and donations to charities. But they also shop for products marketed by vendors and organizations, such as: Sudara (sudara.org) Punjammies sewn in India by women rescued before they are lost to the sex trade; Combat Flip Flops (combatflipflops.com) shoes, clothing, and jewelry (made from melted unexploded ordinance-UXO) by local entrepreneurs in conflict zones; SERRV (serrv.org) and Novica (novica.com) clothing and handcrafted jewelry; and the World Fair Trade Organization (WFTOMarket.com).

     From May 21 to May 25, 2018, the Sustainable Apparel Coalition will meet in Vancouver, Canada, to urge wider use of its HiggIndex hang tags that assign numbers, the higher the better, that represent how eco-friendly garments are.

Keep Closet Rejects Out of Landfills and Oceans

At a middle school reunion we were passing around pictures, when I saw one of me wearing a vest I had made out of an outgrown skirt. For a time, the landfill was spared. Schools where students wear uniforms spare landfills and parents' expenses by hosting back-to-school exchanges to recycle outgrown uniforms to younger classmates. Besides outgrowing clothes and shoes, there are plenty of reasons to get rid of old clothes. Styles change, moths eat sweaters, washing at the wrong heat setting shrinks pants.

In addition to recycling clothes at yard sales or donating them to thrift stores, retailers, such as H&M, are offering new options. Stores have bins and exchange discount coupons for used clothing customers bring in for donations to charities. Some Nike and Converse stores have Reuse-A-Shoe programs that collect any brand of athletic shoes (none with spikes or cleats and no sandals, flip-flops, dress shoes, or boots, however). At facilities in Memphis, Tennessee, or Meerhout, Belgium (whichever is closest), shoes are ground into raw material and used for sport and playground surfaces, apparel, and new footwear. More information about Nike's recycling program is available at nikegrind.com.

There are efforts to keep discarded clothing out of landfills by unraveling sweaters to reuse wool and by turning cotton items into cleaning cloths, insulation, bedding, and home furnishings.

Synthetic fibers are a worse problem, since washing clothes made from textiles, such as polyester and acrylic, with detergents releases micro plastic fibers that slip through wastewater treatment plants and into waterways, where they become "food" for aquatic organisms, such as plankton, and fish. A single fleece jacket can release as many as a million synthetic fibers in a single washing, especially if washed with powdered, rather than liquid, detergent. Fabric softener has been shown to reduce shedding, as does using a short, gentle wash cycle and cool water. Research also has shown coatings like chitosan, a finish derived from crustacean shells, have helped reduce fiber loss. Washing machine devices that trap the synthetic fibers from clothes held in mesh bags and balls that attract fibers also are being tried. When synthetic materials end up in landfills, they can take from 20 to 200 years to decompose.

Overall, the subject of fabric pollution has been slow to attract financing for research and development of recycling processes and ways to reduce fabric pollution. Reducing clothing purchases is one way consumers can instantly help solve the problem.