Fast fashion:
The term fast fashion refers to a large sector of the fashion industry whose business model relies on cheap and speedy production of low quality clothing, which gets pumped quickly through stores in order to meet the latest and newest trends.
The term was first coined by the New York Times in the early 1990s when Spanish apparel giant Zara arrived in New York, to describe the brand’s mission to take only 15 days for a garment to go from the design stage to being sold in stores. Some of the biggest and most notable fast fashion brands in the world include the likes of UNIQLO, Forever 21 and H&M.
The fast fashion business model involves rapid design, production, distribution and marketing, allowing brands and retailers to pull large quantities of greater product variety and allow consumers to get more style and product differentiation at a low price.
However, a system that relies on such cheap and rapid production only encourages excessive consumption as people are inherently attracted to low priced goods, many of which are slaves to the latest trends. For individual consumers, it is also easier and more economic to snatch up cheap clothing that have short life spans compared to splurging on high quality, long lasting items that will very shortly fall out of popularity. [Earth.org]
That’s a new one on me, but my Arts Editor is knowledgeable. Noted in “Fast fashion is ruining the planet – here’s how to make it sustainable,” Graham Lawton, NewScientist (4 June 2022, paywall):
A FRIEND of mine runs a vintage clothes shop in north London. Every few weeks, she visits a vast warehouse on the edge of the city to rummage through piles of discarded clothing. Most of it is worthless, but if you know what you are looking for, there are diamonds in the rough.
The warehouse has a long history. It was once a clearing house for the low-quality wool scraps called shoddy that were used to make cheap clothing for the masses in Victorian Britain. A century on, little has changed. Nowadays, it is full of modern-day shoddy: low-quality cotton, polyester, viscose and nylon, all in the form of cheap clothing made for the masses around the world. Except that this stuff is going to landfill and incinerators, not being reused.
The items are the products of an industry that, in the past 30 years, has become one of the most successful and also most destructive on the planet. Known as fast fashion, it has filled our wardrobes with cheap and cheerful clothes. But after three decades of remorseless growth, the model is butting up against fundamental environmental limits and there is widespread agreement – even from within the industry – that it is time to hit the brakes.
How about if we just get rid of fast fashion? Just have a negative, noticeable reaction everytime you sight someone wearing fast fashion. You’ll be punched only two or three times, I’m sure.
I must admit to being charmed by the nouning of the word shoddy. Rather like C&H, but different.
