Mending is an act of rebellion

Rethinking our relationship to what we own

Simple climate action  //   I S S U E   # 2 6    //   F A S H I O N

The  year of buying nothing

By Jemima Kiss

Amy Booth decided that 2020 would be a no-buy year. An entire year without buying clothes and shoes, as well as nearly everything else she’d normally buy for her home during the year. She made some exceptions for rubber gloves and cleaning sponges, and books. But no kitchen equipment, furniture, home decorations — or fashion.

“Taking a year off made me rethink my relationship with objects,” she says. “A no-buy year made me see my clothes in a new way.” Once she knew that she’d have to make her clothes last the year, she started treating them differently. She’d notice, and then repair, small holes and tears she spotted in clothing. She broke her own rules to buy bought an embroidery hoop, and discovered how much it helped to repair pieces. 

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A post shared by Amy Booth (@amybwriter)

“I became convinced that the garment that actually can't be fixed anymore is about as rare as a unicorn,” says Booth, a writer based in Argentina. She found a thriving community of menders through social media sharing sewing hacks and knitwear repair tips. “Mending is an act of rebellion, because it shows that we can get off the hamster wheel. Instead of working more hours to buy more things, this is us daring to dedicate love and care to the things we already own, so that they last forever.”

And mending can be a feminist act, too. Amy points to Jennifer Odell’s book How to do Nothing, in which Odell describes how society tells women that to be successful, we must constantly create new things. “Mending has often been disregarded as women's work,” says Amy. “It is a rebellion against every attempt to undermine our sense of self-worth by telling us that we need to spend our hard-earned wages needlessly replacing perfectly good clothes, because that's what it takes to be beautiful.”

Amy eventually made it through to 7 December without buying any new clothes. She caved in during a long bike ride after burning her thighs badly. She could either buy some trousers or take the train home. “So I bought the trousers,” she says. “And my first garment in a year — gorgeous, loose floral trousers perfect for the sweltering porteño summer — felt like utter luxury.”

• Amy Booth is an investigative reporter based in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and a Hothouse reader

Taking action against fast fashion

By Michael J Coren

The fashion industry runs on a paradox. The more we buy, the more we crave. To stay current and cool, the industry says we need to buy more. Between 2000 and 2014, people bought 60% more garments yet kept them half as long. As the research suggests, that’s a hedonistic treadmill to nowhere. Clothes shoppers in the study reported feeling they had “nothing to wear” if it wasn’t new. Those who went on a ‘fashion detox’ rediscovered what made their clothes pleasurable again. All this hints at a fashion industry that can turn away from disposal fast fashion, and toward a more sustainable future. 

We have a personal role to play in reducing the climate impact of the fashion industry. The single most important thing you can do is to buy better, buy less, and mend what you have. That’s sending a signal to the market as more buyers care about where their clothes came from — and companies are listening. Look for labels supporting recycled and reclaimed materials, regenerative farming initiatives, fair labor practices, and preferred fibers. And if you still need a fast fix, try renting. Fast fashion is a sugar high, but slow fashion nourishes. 

Photo by Artificial Photography on Unsplash

We can’t buy our way out of this problem. Luckily, buying better quality clothes means they last longer and look better. Mending small tears and nicks might have once seemed déclassé, but it’s in fashion once again. As we’ve written about, groups like Mend Assembly and companies like Patagonia are embracing the repair and reuse model. As Amy Booth told us, fixing our things serves as an act of rebellion. Rather than pulling out a credit card to solve a problem, we learn to rely on ourselves a bit more than before. Our clothes only become more valuable for it (one workshop repairs sends its visible mends out into the world with golden thread). Support the new mending shops popping up, or learn to do it yourself (there’s a thriving community to support you). 

Finally, we need systematic change. Lawmakers are contemplating policies that incentivize sustainable innovation and production. A 2019 UK government report called for an end to the era when companies“chased the cheap needle around the planet.” Instead, the  UK Parliament's Environment Audit Committee argued, “retailers must take responsibility for the social and environmental cost of clothes.” By using their leverage, companies can drive up environmental and labor standards in the market, and radically reduce their impact. 

Ultimately, we are moving toward a world in which companies selling clothes will be asked to take responsibility for their impact from cradle to grave (and back again, perhaps). This discussion of extended-producer responsibility is only just beginning. But it’s one you can raise with CEOs and policymakers. It’s easy enough: let your representative or favorite fashion brand know this is something you’re expecting. It’s the first step in a long journey to a different relationship with what we wear. 

Hothouse is a weekly climate action newsletter written and edited by Jemima Kiss, Mike Coren and Jim Giles. We rely on readers to support us, and everything we publish is free to read.