Rethinking Your Fast Fashion Tendencies

I’m going to start this off by saying that I’m not an expert in sustainability and ethics, and I’m not pretending to be an expert in it. My sole intention in sharing my thoughts on the subject are to help you get your thoughts going on it as well.

Fast fashion. It’s a fairly new term to most people. I myself have probably only heard it thrown around for the past two years, at most. For me, my fascination with fast fashion really only lasted through high school and maybe a little bit after. Eventually, I realized that keeping up with every new trend was just hard work and cost me a lot of money. The money part is really what I want to focus on.

I had a moment today where I was checking out the new sustainable/ethical clothing line of a fairly famous podcast host. My gut reaction was to balk at the cost of the clothes. $62.00 for a sweater? And being someone who knows how to sew, I was even more shocked at the price and quite frankly disapproving of the thought of actually buying it.

The most interesting part to me, is that the seamstress side of me should be the exact reason that I am okay with that price. The reason that I actually know that it is a good price for something that claims to be ethically sourced and made of natural fibers.

Because I now thought it was wrong of me to be so shocked at the price, I had to get to the reason why. I mean, I know the cost of fabric. Even cheap fabric is pricey. I know the cost of sewing notions. I also know that if I sewed for a living, I would want to be paid an appropriate amount of money. So why was I so against the price? It’s simple. The price is actually the ONLY thing that I’m thinking about.

When I buy a $10.00 shirt from T.J. Maxx, I’m not doing the research on where the fabric is sourced and how durable it is and how long it’s going to last me. I’m literally just thinking “Oh cool! $10.00 for a shirt!”. And for someone that claims to sew because she wants her clothes to be higher quality, that’s just odd.

We all know the phrase “quality over quantity”, and all claim to mean it at some point. But do we understand what that means fully?

I used to write brands off for being “out of my price range”, not even thinking about how the quality could potentially differ. I’m not saying that all brands that are expensive are any better than others (Free People…) but that SOME probably are.

Quality over quantity. But like, for real.

I couldn’t tell you which brands they are or which stores, but they have got to be out there with this new surge in everyone wanting more accountability and sustainability. I can’t help but think about the time before mass production, when going to pick out fabric for a new dress WAS luxury and people did spend a lot of money, knowing that they were getting quality. Knowing that it was going to last them a long time. I’m by no means saying that you can only buy one pair of shoes or one dress to last you a few years. But I am suggesting that you spend that money that you were going to spend on 20 things at T.J. Maxx, on one quality piece that is probably the same price

I know that since I started sewing, I have been far more reluctant to buy any clothes. But when I do, I try and will continue trying to be thoughtful about what I buy. That includes considering my Kibbe type, my actual taste, whether I have one just like it, if I will actually wear it, if I can just make it instead, AND if it will actually last. Because after a while, those cheap, crappy clothes add up to what could have been years worth of use of one good garment.

Isabella Kathleen