When I was looking at those Bottle Rocket men’s jeans the other day, I got to thinking, how would someone know if a piece of clothing was sustainable or not?
Is there a set of standards for sustainable fashion?
Photo from behind the scenes at Vancouver’s Eco Fashion Week in April 2012 – credit Creative Commons – Jason Hargrove
The Green Shows — remember them? The NY marketing and consulting company dedicated to ethical and sustainable values in the fashion industry –, well they have gone ahead and laid out a set of standards or “criteria” you might call it with some of the most eco-friendly and sustainable practices that are done by designers, retailers and manufactures today. They use this criteria to evaluate which designers to have on their runway shows, however, I think it also lays out a good understanding of what an ethical piece of clothing might look like. Seeing as they are the fashion experts putting on these runway shows, I best believe their set of standards must be right on target.
- FAIR / ETHICAL TRADE : responsibility towards human rights, reasonable work hours, no child labor, the right to unionize, a fair living wage, higher environmental and social standards. No direct environmental influences that have an impact on people in the work-place in the form of vapors, gases, dust particles, noise, and temperature.
- LOCAL : Designed and constructed in your local community.
- CUSTOM / TAILOR MADE : Also called demi-couture or made-to-order. This is a way of encouraging quality and “slow fashion” over mass-produced disposable fashion.
- CRAFT / ARTISAN : Products that have been crafted using artisan skills (e.g. embroidery), which preserve and perpetuate ancestral traditions.
consumer SHOCK 