Clothing can be a wonderful way to express oneself, but concerns over unethical practices in the fashion industry can make it hard to build a wardrobe with a clear conscience.
Thrifting, upcycling and donating are a few ways that consumers can lessen their ecological footprint.
Lynne Trulio, San Jose State environmental studies department chair and professor, said fast fashion is one of the biggest contributors to environmental issues.
Fast fashion is the term used to describe the method whereby the fashion industry cycles through trends at an extremely high pace, according to an Ethical Consumer webpage.
As a result, purchases and disposal of clothing happen equally as fast.
“The fashion industry has really gotten a lot worse for the environment over recent decades,” Trulio said. “Those who are interested in fashion feel the pressure to constantly keep up and buy new things on a very fast basis. As a result, we are buying and throwing away clothing at a much higher rate than we ever used.”
She said it is important to highlight sustainable alternatives because fashion trends are coming and going faster than ever.
Trulio said one of the main concerns associated with fast fashion is the resulting strain on landfills.
The fashion industry produces over 92 million tons of waste each year and uses 79 trillion liters of water, according to an April 7, 2020 article by Nature Reviews Earth and Environment.
“The thing is that clothing has an impact in all kinds of realms,” Trulio said. “There’s an amazing array of impacts, environmental but also social.”
Trulio said it is important to realize the social impacts of the fashion industry and the people it harms.
“Most clothing is produced in lower-income countries in factories by people making very little money with very little protection for their health in these workplaces,” she said.
One way consumers can avoid contributing to the strain on landfills is by donating their unwanted clothing to local thrift stores or companies such as USAgain.
USAgain is a for-profit textile recycling company that offers TreeMachine, a drop box in cities that accepts clothes, shoes and household textiles in reusable condition.
The content gets shipped to wholesalers, graders and retailers in the U.S. and around the world.
Applied anthropology master’s student Rebecca Carmick said the fashion industry is detrimental to the environment in ways that many don’t realize.
“The fashion industry and clothing is a huge contributor of waste from production to distribution to disposal,” Carmick said. “It's an area that some people may not always recognize as a contributing factor to our waste stream.”
Carmick works as an intern for SJSU’s Office of Sustainability, an office that aims to reduce SJSU’s ecological footprint.
The Office of Sustainability partnered with SJSU Cares to establish Spartan Clothes Closet, a resource for students that seeks to alleviate clothing waste and have students meet their basic needs.
“Instead of members of the SJSU community potentially throwing their unwanted clothing items away, they donate them to our closet which in turn could become a well-loved piece of clothing for someone else,” Carmick said.
Carmick said if consumers decide they want to give their unwanted clothes one last chance, they can also try to upcycle or repurpose them.
Software engineering senior Eva Nicola said she started learning how to sew and make alterations to her own clothing in 2018.
She said she picked up the hobby after she learned about the harmful effects of fast fashion after watching some documentaries.
“The most sustainable fabric is the fabric that already exists,” Nicola said. “If I want something specific, I learn how to make it and I can have whatever I want and I can save money.”
Nicola said she started by learning how to use a sewing machine and how it was quite intuitive to learn.
She said she advises beginners to stick with the hobby and think about the environmental and personal benefits to crafting one’s own clothing.
“Now I feel a lot more emotional bond to my clothes, they tell more of a story about me,” Nicola said. “If someone compliments me on something, I get to say, ‘Oh thank you, I made this,’ and it feels really great to say.”
