SLOW FASHION. SLOW SHOPPING.

El slow fashion defend a more ethical and responsible form of consumption, as well as become aware of the relationship between customers and vendors. It is the opposite pole of fast fashion: it takes into account the procedures and resources necessary to create clothing, promoting the equitable treatment of people, animals and the environment. This concept, in its triple aspect –ecological, economic and social- implies an important change in the current scale of values ​​and attitudes, whether from the point of view of environmental sustainability and the use of natural resources, as well as economic development and social progress. 

If the logic of fast fashion is that of hyperproduction and hyperconsumption, of low cost and low quality (without measuring the human and environmental impact), the “slow fashion"first the quality and durability of garments always taking into account the time of each process (that is where its value lies). We could summarize it in the famous phrase of Vivienne Westwood, a British fashion designer considered to be the main person responsible for the aesthetics associated with punk and New Wave"Buy less, choose well, make it last" (buy less, choose well and make it last).

In 2018, the UN declared an Environmental Emergency due to fast fashion due to the excessive use of natural resources and the pollution generated through the processes that it entails. For a garment to be sustainable, its production process must respect the environment and its materials must be natural or organic, as well as being socially responsible, which means that its production chain cares for the conditions of workers struggling against labor exploitation.

Already in 1990 the New York Times y Spindrift published articles on the environmental trend in the world of fashion, and in the same year the British fashion designer Katharine Hamnett, who has often been recognized as one of the first designers to combine environmental activism with fashion, gave a speech on the environmental impacts of fashion at the United Nations. Since then, this current has been gaining more and more defenders who seek more sustainable ways of life and related to their ideologies, understanding the responsibility of the consumer and their possible active role in changing the prevailing dynamics.

The history of the clothes we wear, the people who make them and their impact on our world highlights the ecological disasters generated by this industry: for example, to make a 250g cotton T-shirt requires about 2.700 liters of water, or some jeans about 11.800 liters. 

The fashion industry is the 2nd most polluting industry on the planet, not only because of the discharge of chemical products and dyes that end up in seas and rivers, but also because of the large amount of physical waste it generates. Each piece of clothing we buy has an average use of only 7 times, and as a general rule they are not natural materials or biodegradable in the short term, which produces about 12 million tons of clothing waste per year.

Consumerism and waste is one of the hallmarks of modern society: Human activity is producing a depletion of natural resources to satisfy the maintenance of the different industries that serve this consumer system. Faced with this, in slow fashion the aspects of quality, exclusivity and sustainability provided to the environment, of which we are a part, are factors that are worth considering when deciding on our next purchase.

The last decade has seen a wave of changes in the fashion industry: An increasing number of brands rejects the principles of fast fashion and choose a more sustainable approach for making clothes. We can maintain awareness of what a brand really stands for and focus on quality… As they say, less is more, right? There's The Fabulous Gang