One of the most worrying things about fashion and the textiles industry is, it’s impact ecologically. Fast fashion has a huge affect on the environment, with toxic dyes contaminating waters, and massively impacting global warming, the quick turn around of micro seasons means that millions of clothes will be bought cheaply, worn once or twice and then thrown away, and end up in landfill. not only does it impact the environment, but also the workers who actually make the clothes. if you really think about it, when buying cheap clothing from high street shops you are essentially buying into a modern type of slave labour, even if the workers are getting paid, they won’t be getting a fair wage. The mark up on a £5 top from Primark will be astronomical, with the original makers getting very little of the money if any at all.

The best ways that we can counter act this, is by recycling, up-cycling, mending, and buying second hand. I personally try to only shop in charity shops, which I find is a lot more exciting than high street shops because you really have to hunt to find things. And when you find something amazing you feel so excited and pleased with yourself, often it will be at a cheaper price than in H S-shops, and also the money is going to charities that will help people. so really its a win win. Another way to help is to mend your clothes if they start to wear out, instead of throwing them away, patch holes, embroider into them to make them more interesting etc. and once they get really too broken to wear, use the fabric to mend your other clothes!!!!!

I have just patched up two holes in my favourite pair of denim dungarees, they originally belonged to my mum twenty years ago, and she bought them second hand, so they’ve had a very long life, and are still wonderful to wear!!

This ethic also applies to materials and fabrics, for textile making and for my costume course, recently I have been going round charity shops finding fabrics to use in costume making, often they have a rail of old curtains or even just clothing with lots of material in it can be useful. My absolute favourite shop in the world is a place called Scrapstore in the borders, its like this huge charity shop purely for materials, anyone can donate materials, (whether its fabrics or art materials) and it is sold for charity at low prices. I would highly recommend that anyone who is creative go there. they have a shop in Selkirk and Musselbourgh.

I also try to buy and use natural materials in clothing and for projects, such as cottons, linen, wool, hemp, silk etc. And boycotting, polyester and plastic based fabrics as much as possible, due to the fact it is derived from fossil fuels that contribute to global warming.

sustainability in textiles and fashion / Yarrow Frost Textiles by blogadmin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0