As we move towards net-zero, the future of cities is not only to set sartorial trends but lead by example in decarbonising our fashion consumption, habits and cultures.
While not all of us fly, drive, or, in the current cost of living crisis, choose to heat our homes, all of us wear clothes. How we obtain, care and dispose of these clothes significantly contributes to the climate crisis we face. According to Bloomberg, the fashion industry is responsible for 10 per cent of carbon emissions, more than international aviation and shipping combined.
UK cities have historically been world trendsetters: from Teddy Boys to Punk, the way our urban inhabitants fashion themselves has inspired the world's sense of style. Our cities also led the way when it came to fast fashion, so much so that their retail outlets became synonymous with the main artery of urban consumption – the High Street. As we move towards net-zero, the future of cities is not only to set sartorial trends but lead by example in decarbonising our fashion consumption, habits and cultures. Below, I set out three horizons for change.
Legislation: We are now aware of the catastrophic effect the formerly dubbed 'high street heroes' have had on our ecological system and the adverse conditions endured by the workers who create their products. The proposed New York Fashion Sustainability and Social Accountability Act will provide a blueprint for setting measurable requirements that large fashion companies will have to meet in order to trade in our cities. These will force brands to clean up their supply chain, improve labour conditions and wages, identify and address social and environmental risks.
Financial: Fast fashion may be cheap at the point of purchase but hides an invisible end-of-life cost. Around the world, a truckload of textiles is landfilled or incinerated every single second. At present, residents have to pay for the collection of large household waste items such as furniture, but there is no such supervision for fashion items – which often end up in landfills. As demonstrated in the state of Vermont, once households are required to pay for waste disposal by the pound, the presence of apparel, particularly of heavy items such as jeans and shoes, significantly decreases in waste management, encouraging mending, circularity, and change in consumer behaviour.
Cultural: Cultivating sustainable fashion habits should start at a young age with a return to sewing and basic garment construction classes in primary and secondary education to inform our young people of the effort and skill required for making clothes. Derelict patches of vegetation near schools should be repurposed as allotments for vegetables and natural dye plants, establishing a connection between everyday consumption of food and clothes to the land. The high street should be reimagined as a place where you can predominantly care for clothes or modify existing items rather than purchase new ones. Mending shops should get incentives, as should a new kind of local designer business, offering upgrading and refreshing services for existing garments. Specialised circular brands of creative reuse will then emerge, creating new items from fast fashion waste consumed in the 2020s. These will set a unique aesthetic and ethos that cities worldwide can follow.