Hello all! It has been quite a while since my last blog post! The primary reason for this is our up-coming move to Northern New Jersey at the beginning of the summer. If you have ever moved at anytime in your life, you know that moving requires some amount of purging. Outgrown toys, old papers, books read long ago, and many other things we tend to collect all come under scrutiny when faced with having to box them up and move them. I was spoiled in our current home, to have a large walk-in closet which of course, was packed with clothes. The house we are moving to has rather small closets, so a closet purge was absolutely necessary, and as it turns out, a really good thing for what it taught me. The clothes that came out of my closet were mostly thrift store purchases as I am an avid thrift store shopper. Like most women who love clothes, I am a bargain hunter. Paying as little as possible for clothing seems to have become a badge of honor. Women love to share how little they paid for their clothing when someone admires an outfit. "love your outfit", "can you believe it? $10 from Goodwill!" or "can you believe it, $15 from the clearance rack at X store!" I well known discount chain actually encourages us to "brag about it" in their slogan. I have been one of those women bragging about how little I paid for my clothes. Should we all really be bragging about being such incredible cheapskates? I am going to make a bold statement and say that no, we definitely should not. Shirts purchased for $3 and skirts for $7 filled bags that went right back to the charity shops. Indeed, I did feel good that most of the clothing I purged from my closet was second hand, thus recycled to begin with, but I did not feel good about having so much clothes in my closet that only made me feel "meh".
My closet purge led me to a recently published book, entitled "Overdressed: the Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion" by Elizabeth Cline. She discusses the growing issue of our over consumption and how clothing has declined in both price and quality. Many of my thrift store purchases came from popular mall chain stores, and when I researched some of these brands (not being a mall shopper), I was shocked at some of the prices, not because they were high, but because they were so cheap. My "bargains" were not really bargains at all, and some of them cost not much less than I would have purchased them for if they were new. The fast fashion trend is a recent development in the clothing world. Trendy clothing stores aimed at the budget strapped millennials offer cheap fashion at increasingly low prices and rotate their stock every few weeks, offering new styles constantly. Their goal is to have shoppers buy more, and buy often, as they make it easy for women to justify such cheap purchases. Many of these clothes end up quickly cast aside to charity shops, who are having an increasingly hard time re-selling the mountains of poorly made clothing they receive.
The slow fashion movement (yes, this is a real thing you can google it!), embraces the same ideas as the popular "slow food" movement. Just as we should be suspicious of a carton of eggs that cost $1.50, so we should also be suspicious of a new dress that costs $15. Sewing is a valued skill, and garment construction once resulted in well made clothing that would last years, not just a single season. It is easy to wag our fingers at the retail giants, but really it is us consumers, and our unwillingness to pay more than $10 for a tank top and $50 for a dress, that have helped drive the fast fashion trend. I see this mindset in people shopping for jewelry as well, and I see where it comes from. One popular mall retailer advertised trendy jewelry for $6, or "two for $10!". It's no wonder some people raise their eyebrows at a $50 necklace. Having gone through bags of "junk jewelry" for salvageable pieces, I can tell you that most of this kind of jewelry ends up in the garbage. Here is the thing that we seem to fail to realize: when we fill our closets with cheaply made clothing and jewelry that don't make us feel great, we are not getting a good "steal". We are being stolen from. Slow fashion is not about having a boring, drab wardrobe, nor is it about running out and replacing your closest with every thing artisan made-organic-sustainable-fair-trade. It is about having less clothing and being more mindful of our purchases. It means being willing to pay more for something well made that will last. Indeed, as I cleaned out my closet, I realized that the clothing I most valued came from independent seamstresses, artisans, designers, and boutiques. This was clothing I did not purchase at a "brag-worthy" price, but really were purchases more worthy of bragging as they will remain in my closet for years to come. Adding up all the "bargains" I ended up not feeling great about and I could have purchased some better quality pieces that I would hold onto. Buying non mass-produced clothing also has the added bonus of not being easily recognized as out of style. In other words, it's nice to wear clothing that a million other people are not also wearing! Many small changes are what help make big changes, and being more mindful of both our clothing and accessory purchases can help our planet, bring clothing manufacturing jobs back to the U.S., and improve working conditions in both oversea and domestic factories. Think twice the next time you are tempted by that great bargain!
