Opportunity
It’s been almost an year now, that this idea was bothering me (literally every day). I was waking up (and still do) with the same question, that I soon realised is a question every single person in this world asks themselves – “What should I wear today?”.
Interestingly enough, one cannot imagine actually how many times the answer to this question is “I don’t know!”. In my case the proportion is 9/10 – yes, in nine out of ten cases I actually have no idea what should I wear this day. So was the case today.
What’s the weather like? What’s the schedule for the day? Quick check of the forecast, glance outside the window, and.. ok, let’s browse my wardrobe… First thing I see and oh no, not the green sweater again, I already wore it twice last week! Let’s try something different today. Ah, this lovely dress needs ironing, and that favourite shirt is in a desperate need for a dry cleaning. Shall I dig deeper? 8 mins later, when half of the clothes are unfolded and messy I take the green sweater again and rush out. In the end of the day – I love it so much!
I can imagine there are so many other souls out there having similar experiences to mine. Some just quickly picking up from the top of the pile, others performing that whole exercise on some subconscious level, without even being aware of it. and the most organi having all that prepared from the night before – ironed and hanged, ready for the next day. In whichever group you fall, you still need to deal with that so universal question.
Numbers
In the same time the clothing industry is booming and the numbers and statistics are terrifying.
£30 billion pounds is the estimation of the unused clothing in our UK wardrobes – mine, yours, your neighbours, your colleagues.. £30 billion pounds frozen in clothes, resting quietly and waiting for their glorious days (that usually never come). And that is only in UK.
In addition to that £140 million worth of clothing goes into landfill every year. And that again is only in UK.
And in the same time for 2016 the amount of clothes purchased in the UK is 1 130 000 tonnes. Raised with 60% over 6 years.
I’ll leave you some time to think and re-read the numbers again.
All this is just a small portion of all the data available out there. Not a very consistent data, as there is no international regulator to gather and organise such, but still enough numbers to support the huge primarily environmental impact of the clothing industry.
Trends and novelties
Terms like “sustainable fashion”, “zero-waste design”, “smart clothing” are out there for a long time now, however currently there is no big impact, let alone proven effects. In addition only 8% of all the clothes are actually being recycled.
And still we all don’t know what to wear…
A change is desperately needed.
Solution
Multiple industries have been completely disrupted by the digital revolution. That is, however, not the case with the clothing one. And if there are still multiple opportunities that can be applied for the recycling part of the process, I believe there’s a huge potential in the re-using part. The only thing that needs to happen is for us to change our consumer behaviour (aka leave that green sweater alone and start using smartly all your clothes).