Isn't That Interesting?

 Dear Reader, 

You know in the fashion world in America we often times look and stores and clothing and thing "meh, no big deal". But, when you walk into any fashion store you have to realize the depth and complexity of what is in front of you. 

1. How many hours did it take from educating the design team to placing the item(s) into a bag for purchase? 

2. What is the actual cost per garment? (especially if you don't use slaves).

3. Where does it all go once people are done with it?

4. What is the shelf life on each piece? 

I wonder about the first question a lot. How many hours out of peoples lives were collectively used to create the items we see? Like, is my wardrobe a collection of an ungodly amount of human life hours? In reality I would have to live 30 lives to actually make the amount of clothes that I own. 

What about the actual cost? This one miffs me. Some brands are worth more than others. But are they if the materials are the same, and the design is similar, and the amount of hours to make each one is the same? Some companies outright use slaves to keep the cost of garments down, while others use people and pay them slave wages to make the clothing, or they put the workers in grave danger because they have poor manufacturing facilities due to cutting costs. It's quite a shame.

Oh yes, and where is all of this fashion going once we use it all up? Did we even finish using that fashion? Or were we just done with that style and were too lazy to donate it? Landfill, into the ocean, or dumped in some random African country, from what I've seen. But, it looks like it could be recycled (maybe). 

Which leads me to my final inquiry, what is the actual shelf life on each piece? It's a dice roll and nobody knows the answer. It is a simple question- how long will this garment be useful? But no one is held accountable, hence we have a lot of junk fashion. Literally things that no one is going to ever wear again because it was not built to last very long. I assume they do this because there are no mandates to inform consumers, everyone just does their own thing. 

We assume, that better brands and spending more money means a better item; but that it not always true. I do agree that some junk brands can make clothing out of tissue paper (shrinks in the wash, bleeds everywhere, is never the same after it gets wet and dries); but not all lower end brands are junk. 

So that brings me to an obvious conclusion, we need better standards in the fashion industry. The waste from fashion is obscene. 

Meanwhile, Dear Reader, we shall continue to buy second hand and try to reduce, recycle, and reuse as much fashion as we can in an attempt to help our suffering planet and future generations. 

Sincerely, 
Smartfindz