Fashion Revolution Week, a week to rethink the fashion you are wearing

Have you ever wondered who made the shirt, shirt or sweater you are wearing and where has it been done? Probably not. It is normal. Until a few years ago, I didn’t ask myself either. Often, when we buy clothes we only look at whether we like that piece that we want to buy, it suits us and the price it has. If the combination of the three factors fits what we have in mind, we go straight through the box without considering anything else. But the Fashion Revolution Week wants to change this purchasing process.

 

Resource of Fashion Revolution Week

 

“You don’t have to be a scholar to see that if we buy t-shirts at € 5 there is someone somewhere on this planet who is paid a pittance or exploited directly to make them”

 

On April 24, 2013, there was a turning point in this fashion consumer trend. It was as a result of the collapse of a textile factory in Bangladesh in which nearly 1,200 people died – most of them women – who were sewing the garments of large western fast fashion chains that many of us can have in our wardrobe. It is not necessary that I tell you names, surely you have already had one in your head, right?

That incident exposed the precarious work situations and the lack of rights of the people who sew these pieces. And it is that you do not have to be a scholar to see that if we buy t-shirts at € 5 there is someone somewhere on this planet who is paid a pittance or exploited directly to make them. So, what labor, moral and environmental cost does that shirt that we have bought as if it were the great bargain have? Much more than we imagine.

 

Picture by Lauren Fleischmann

 

Whenever a misfortune occurs, however, there are those who make it an opportunity to change the system that until then was in force. And that’s why, as a result of that fateful accident, a whole online movement was born that grows and consolidates year after year: Fashion Revolution Week. This is a week dedicated to reclaiming sustainable, local and respectful fashion for workers’ rights. And this year it is celebrated from April 20 to 26.

 

“The promoters of Fashion Revolution Week bet for an ethical and valued fashion”

 

And it is that in the face of fast fashion, of the monthly collections, of the low-quality pieces that only last a few months, the promoters of Fashion Revolution Week bet for an ethical and valued fashion. For this reason, during the next week you will see how the network fills up with posters and initiatives where small creators and local designer brands take a step forward and tell you that it is they who have made the products they sell, which have passed through their hands. And that every time you buy one of their creations you are helping them to continue with their businesses. And now, with the health and economic crisis we are experiencing, it is more necessary than ever to support these types of projects so that they can continue.

One of the main drawbacks of this ethical fashion is its price, yes. It is much higher, when compared to the € 5 shirt or € 15 pants proposed by the large chains that occupy the centers of our cities. But who is abusing the price? The small producer that works with local suppliers and favors the economy of the territory or the company that produces at ridiculous prices on the other side of the world?

 

Resource of Fashion Revolution Week

“Fashion Revolution Week is so necessary in order to make consumers aware of the Need, we rethink what kind of fashion we consume and whether or not we are complicit in the inequalities that it generates”

 

That is why Fashion Revolution Week is so necessary: In order to make consumers aware of the need, we rethink what kind of fashion we consume and whether or not we are complicit in the inequalities that it generates on the other side of the world. It is also a time to question the big chains directly and ask who is behind the pieces that we can find in our closet or in stores, if they are advertising a fair price for the raw material they use and if they are production systems that are respectful of environment.

So I encourage you to flip the shirt, sweater or shirt you are wearing. Take a photo with your piece inside out and hang on social media with the hashtag #whomademyclothes and ask the brand that has done it directly. Join the movement ‘Who made my clothes?’ And ask for explanations. More and more of us are doing it.