common sense for the common good

Green Garbs

November 16th, 2006 by Vihar Sheth
Posted in Responsibility, Society, Style

The idea that most of the designs presented at a fashion show are junk just got truer.

The Ethical Fashion Show, to be held in Paris in 2007, will showcase the creation of the winner of the Scrap Fashion Eco Competition. To enter the competition: “Create a fashion item using old denim. Either customise the denim or make something else. Your creation should be made ecologically; the denim you used is to be thrown away or you used sustainable material to customise it.” Those are quite possibly the worst instructions I’ve ever read for anything ever. And to spell customize that way to boot!

Regardless, both events make me randy because perishable consumer goods, of which clothing is a large component, contribute huge amounts of waste to the environment. Not only that, the clothing industry encourages unfair and unsustainable labor standards. Hopefully shows and competitions like the two mentioned above will change that. Add the mercurial ideas of what’s “in” and what’s “out” to seasonality and you get the foundation of a supremely disposable society. Let us thank our various gods and society there are enough poor people out there to accept our hand-me-downs. Maybe poverty is a fashion conspiracy! Gotta move product folks.

Anywho, the winner of the Scrap Fashion Eco Competition will be selected based on “design concept, innovation and environmental awareness”. I like what I hear so far. The site also covers the topics:

  • What is Ethical Fashion?
  • Fair Trade and Fashion
  • Organic and Eco Fashion
  • Recycling and Customization
  • Cheap Fashion, Fast Fashion
  • Culture and Artisanal Skills

The Ethical Fashion section provides a great anecdotal piece called, “The journey of a pair of jeans from cotton plant to rubbish tip“. Keep in mind the site’s British. I think rubbish tip might mean top of the garabe pile. It could also mean, quite literally, the tip of a rubbish, which could be an eraser, a lie, or perhaps even a giant conspiracy by the fashion industry to keep lots of people poor!

p.s. Thanks to Become’s Pocket Change, which published an article of mine in its latest Carnival of Shopping.



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