This Saturday 27th of April we had as part of our big community day for Fashion Revolution UAE, a clothes swap in collaboration with Global Fashion Exchange. It was super nice! We got help from some students from Marangoni and the coordination of Gauri and Anwita – two brilliant Fashion Revolutionaries.
I brought in 10 items- 8 dresses and 2 bags- and got myself 10 pieces out. To be honest, as I was hosting the whole day and introducing the different activities, it was hectic for me. I only realized the Swap was finished when I saw the big bag of the items packed. So, with not much time and the help of the ladies that were packing to get at least something my size, we took some pieces out of the bunch.
I love the items the ladies got for me but to my surprise, out of the 10 items… 2 had the tags on! They were brand new. Can you imagine? Someone bought these gorgeous pieces and never got to wear them. Not even a single time. This leads me to my reflection… there are so many items out there (overproduction), we are in overdrive in terms of consumption and buy, buy, buy without much thought… (overconsumption).
We are in a spiral of More, More, and More… that will take us Where?… To a World full of waste, with no clean water, with no clean air, with toxic soils that can no longer feed us… I know it might sound too apocalyptic. Maybe you don’t see the correlation. Maybe you live in a first world country and you don’t get to suffer this as yet. But this is already a reality for many producing countries.
It is time to change our ways. Support fashion that is respectful to Mama Earth, to their makers, that doesn’t have toxic dyes or synthetic materials that will take forever to biodegrade. We need to embrace circularity but first and foremost we need to slow down.
Take your time to breath in, breath out and make a world a better place by slowing down your consumption habits. Buy only what you need. Invest in quality pieces, support the artisans, the makers, the people that care for their habitat. What is cheap, you will end up paying twice.
