Transitioning to a more sustainable wardrobe
Let’s start with the obvious. As consumers, we all wear clothes, and as Americans, we spend a lot of money buying those clothes. This website will examine brands trying to develop and implement sustainable supply chains and production cycles. Some brands are already deep into this transition; some are just starting to become more environmentally friendly, and some still aren’t doing anything. We’ll examine how the brands and our purchasing habits need to change.
Curating a sustainable wardrobe takes work. Going online or walking into a store and buying something just because you like it is relatively effortless. All that changes when you decide to be more intentional about the clothes you buy and wear.
Here are a few questions to get you started:
- If you are out shopping, look at the tag to determine whether the garment is made of natural, synthetic, or a blend of materials. Natural textiles like wool, silk, linen, and cotton are easier to recycle or reuse as they are biodegradable. This is important since synthetic materials, such as polyester, nylon, and acrylic, make up 60% of the material used to make clothes. These materials contain plastic and shed microplastics into our water supply every time they go through a laundry cycle.
- If there is a brand you like, check out its website. Does it offer information on where and how their products are made? Is the brand actively trying to limit resource use, such as fossil fuels and water? Does it pay its workers a living wage and provide a healthy and safe environment?
- Does the brand offer solutions to recycle, repurpose, or reuse its product when no longer wanted by the consumer? See our Re-directory list of brands that have set up trade-in, take back or re-sale programs.
These questions apply to everything we buy. If a brand is actively trying to make its company more environmentally friendly, the answers should be on its website. But don’t take everything you read at face value. Greenwashing or deliberately making consumers think that a brand is eco-friendly is common. It is critical to start being curious and a bit cynical when you are shifting to purchasing clothes that are less harmful to the environment.
The process does get easier as you learn more about what you wear. Consumers will also get much-needed help once robust state, federal, and international legislation is passed to regulate how brands and retailers conduct business.
Below are some suggestions for transitioning your wardrobe to one less harmful to the environment. It starts with taking inventory of what you already own and possibly donating or selling a few items you might realize you don’t need or want anymore. It does not mean getting rid of all the clothes in your closet and replacing them with more sustainable ones. A key tenent of a sustainable wardrobe is to wear the clothes you have for as long as possible rather than constantly buying anything new.
Keep, Donate, Sell or Recycle
If you don’t know what you have, it will be impossible to know what you need.
- Get some large recyclable or reusable bags, empty boxes, and fine a work area to separate your clothes into five categories: keep, donate, sell, recycle, and not sure.
- Look at your clothes, accessories, and shoes and sort them into the categories listed above. Anything you aren’t 100% certain you will ever wear again, put it into the not sure pile and reconsider later.
- Put everything you want to keep back in your closet or dresser. Use this as an opportunity to organize your clothes. Try arranging clothes by item and color (blue denim, white denim, colored denim). It will make things easier the next time you go to get dressed, and your closet will look great
- Go through your other four boxes again and ensure everything is where you want it to be: donate, sell, recycle, or not sure.
- Once you’ve sorted the items accordingly, take everything meant for donation or recycling to a local donation/recycling center. If you’re unsure where to go, use the Council for Textile Recycling’s Wear, Donate, Recycle website. It allows you to search by zip code and find the nearest drop-off locations for textiles. If that doesn’t work, call Town Hall and see if they can help.
If you decide to sell your clothes, there are various options depending on the brand. Some advice: any clothing you intend to sell must be clean and in excellent or very good condition. This means free from holes, tears, odd smells, broken zippers, or missing buttons. Resale is experiencing a surge in popularity, and many brands have launched their own peer-to-peer resale platforms. We have compiled a list that can be found here to get you started. Let us know if there is a program we should add.
Third-party giants like The Real Real, Vestiare Collective, Thredup, and Poshmark provide platforms for selling a wide range of brands. However, except for Poshmark, verifying which brands they accept is essential, as they regularly change depending on inventory. While reselling does prolong the life -span of clothing, many items, regrettably, still end up in landfills. Keep this in mind when you go shopping and try to purchase only what you truly need.
