Stay ConnectedWARDROBE CRISIS is a fashion podcast about sustainability, ethical fashion and making a difference in the world. Your host is author and journalist Clare Press, who was the first ever Vogue sustainability editor. Each week, we bring you insightful interviews from the global fashion change makers, industry insiders, activists, artists, designers and scientists who are shaping fashion’s future.
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Copyright: © 2022 Clare Press
This week we sit down with New Yorker Mara Hoffman to find out how she turned her namesake brand into a sustainable fashion leader, what makes her tick - from astrology and to the inspirational beauty of Mother Earth, and being a mamma thinking about the next generation.
The MH brand does a bunch of cool stuff, like working with natural dyes and regenerative agriculture projects. There’s even a peer-to-peer preloved Mara Hoffman marketplace called Full Circle. They also work with a local social enterprise called Custom Collaborative that provides jobs and training for from low-income and immigrant communities.
In this warm discussion, Mara and Clare discuss why we still need physical stores and spaces to connect is in ways that aren’t quite the same online. The burden of physical stuff, the responsibility that comes being a designer today. And plants! And SATC legend Patricia Field. Enjoy! Mara is tops.
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Do we really believe that we can pursue infinite growth on a finite planet? Why would we even want to?
This week's guest is Tim Jackson, the ecological economist who wrote Post Growth, Life After Capitalism.
It's a very persuasive argument for a complete rethink of how we define success, and why we need a new type of economy, one that prioritises relationships and meaning, over profits and power. Tim sees this book as "both a manifesto for system change and an invitation to rekindle a deeper conversation about the nature of the human condition.” Sound good?
What that might look like practically? How could we get there? On this Episode, Tim and Clare discuss all this and more, from how advertising fuels overconsumption and why big companies are banking on green growth, to the future of work, what a single universal income could do for us, and even a bit of fashion – by way of an 18th century philosopher.
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After two years of fashion weeks globally being more or less on pandemic pause, they're back.
Last week the Paris couture shows drew crowds in the French capital. As we publish, Scandinavia is in the spotlight with Copenhagen's event. The big four are going ahead this month, albeit with a few big names missing and some format changes. London's will be a gender neutral digital-physical event, showing "menswear, womenswear and gender neutral collections" - after London Fashion Week Men's was cancelled in January. New York is planning with physical shows, despite Tom Ford having to cancel due to Omicron disruptions. And while the schedules for Milan and Paris womenswear have yet to be published, they are expected to include some heavy hitters, including Gucci in Milan.
So, we ask – is this the start of everything going back to the way it used to be? Why shouldn’t it be? And what is the alternative? Do need fashion weeks at all? How can we reinvent them? What role could they play in sustainability?
This week's guest is Cecilie Thorsmark, CEO of Copenhagen Fashion Week. Discover how she introduced pioneering new sustainability requirements as a condition of brands showing on the Danish runway, and what it takes to get the carbon footprint of an event like this down.
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And you thought Zara was fast fashion! Buckle up because new trends are landing daily if not hourly, as a new breed of online disruptor throws out thousands of styles a week to see what sticks. Brands like Boohoo, Pretty Little Thing and Fashion Nova are part of a new ultra-fast fashion era, but Shein is by far the biggest player.
Worth a reported $47 billion, the Chinese company is now the biggest selling fast fashion brand in the US. But how does it work? What's the secret to its giant reach? And just how many items does it drop in a week?
In our first episode for Series 7, host Clare Press sits down with the American journalists Meaghan Tobin and Louise Matsakis who, along with Beijing-based Wency Chen, spent six months looking into this, from every possible angle. From speaking to garment workers and interviewing shoppers to tracking down one young TikTok user who saw her vintage vest morph into thousands of copies, taking her personal photo along for the ride - without her permission.
Let us know what you think. Follow Clare on Instagram @mrspress @thewardrobecrisis
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You've probably heard about degrowth, which is: "a planned reduction of energy and resource use designed to bring the economy back into balance with the living world in a way that reduces inequality and improves human well-being." (If this idea is new to you, have a listen to Episode 135 with economist Jason Hickel).
Question: is it time to apply such thinking more specifically to the fashion industry? What would that look like?
This week's podcast presents the ideas of a new fashion activist organisation called Fashion Act Now (FAN), born out of Extinction Rebellion. They are calling for "a radical defashion future" - their interpretation of: "the role fashion must play in degrowth. It is a transition to post-fashion clothing systems that are regenerative, local, fair, nurturing and sufficient for the needs of communities."
They argue that the current system - which they call Fashion with a capital 'F' - is not only environmentally unsustainable because it's addicted to overproduction, but, in its current form, morally bankrupt being built on oppression.
"Defashion may sound negative," says FAN co-founder and former fashion journalist Bel Jacobs, "but we think of it as a movement of joy, possibility, liberation. It does not mean the end of beautiful clothing."
On this podcast, you will hear from Jacobs, along with her fellow FAN co-founder, the activist Sara Arnold;Extinction Rebellion co-founder (a former fashion designer herself) Clare Farrell; anthropologist Sandra Niessen (who has researched the clothing and textile tradition of the Batak people of Sumatra, Indonesia, for almost 40 years); fashion museum curator and founder of Denier Shonagh Marshall; and New York-based stylist Samantha Weir.
To take the Fashion Act Now pledge, see here.
Follow them on Instagram here.
Head over to https://thewardrobecrisis.com/podcast/2021/12/6/ep-152-fashion-act-now-is-time-to-defashion to read yours and #bethechange
Thank you for listening to Wardrobe Crisis.
Find the shownotes here.
This is the final Episode of Series 6. See you in January 2022 for Series 7!
Don't be a stranger - follow Clare on Instagram @mrspress @thewardrobecrisis
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More than half of all the textiles use today are polyester. You will definitely have poly in your wardrobe, even if you prefer natural fibres. Synthetics are lurking everywhere, whether as polyester, nylon, or blends mixed with cotton. Poly is cheap, ubiquitous and it's not going away any time soon. It's also made from fossil fuels, doesn't biodegrade and most of it ends up as waste.
Cyndi Rhoades believes recycled is the answer.
A UK-based, US-raised activist turned entrepreneur, she founded Worn Again Technologies (originally called Worn Again) in 2005 - determined to make a difference and create a business out of solving the challenge of textiles ending up in landfill or incineration.
Initially, she looked to upcycling. “It was really hard it make it work at scale, but also ultimately we weren’t solving the problem of textile waste," she says. "Once these second-life products were used, they would end up in landfill anyway. So we were only postponing textiles going to landfill. It made us realise that recycling at a molecular level was the solution.”
From her formative days in London's early 2000s sustainable fashion scene, to living on a barge off-the-grid today, Cyndi has a long view on how this space has evolved and what's coming next.
Ever wondered how virgin polyester is actually made? Did you know the recycled kind is almost always made from recycled plastic bottles, not textiles? How sustainable is it? How do we decide? It is greenwashing? Can we really make fashion circular? What would that look like? Why is it taking so damn long? This Episode is like a masterclass in material-to-material recycling.
Head over to https://thewardrobecrisis.com/podcast/2021/10/16/ep-151-whats-the-story-with-recycled-polyester-cyndi-rhoades-from-worn-again-explains-all to read yours and #bethechange
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Are you unwittingly contributing to waste colonialism via your wardrobe choices? What happens to our unwanted clothes when we donate them? Overproducing and underusing clothes has far-reaching consequences, as this week's guest Liz Ricketts of The Or Foundation explains.
Each week, around 15 million pieces of secondhand clothing arrive in the Kantamanto second-hand clothing market in Accra, Ghana - and 40% goes to waste.
This is the story of how your old shirt or dress or pants might end up clogging drains in Accra. Or form part of a heavy rope of textiles in the ocean, or lurking under the sand like some dystopian synthetic sea monster. Or smouldering on a waste mountain in an informal dump that’s been on fire months.
It doesn’t have to be this way - maybe your old clothes will get fixed up and sold on to live another life. It’s complicated, as are the solutions.
What do you think? Let us know! We're on Instagram @mrspress and @thewardrobecrisis, and on Twitter @mrspress
Head over to https://thewardrobecrisis.com/podcast/2021/9/29/ep-150-liz-ricketts-waste-colonialism-dead-white-mans-clothes to read yours and #bethechange
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Are you a special person? How self-obsessed are we, as a society? How and why do we compare ourselves to others? What makes us group-ish? Violent? Or community minded? How about narcissistic? And is that getting worse?
This week's guest is the British author Will Storr, who's latest book is Status Game: on social position and how we use it.
After reading one of his previous books - Selfie, How We Became So Self-Obsessed and What It's Doing to Us - Clare persuaded him to come on Wardrobe Crisis and share his ideas and research about what lies beneath our social media culture, power games, virtue signalling and obsession with getting ahead.
Will is also the author of a book, TED talk and creative writing class called The Science of Storytelling.
In this lively discussion, Will and Clare talk about everything from Ancient Greece to TIME magazine covers; the origins of the self-esteem movement to Instagram; narcissism, perfectionism, mental health and the origins of western individualism.
What do you think? Let us know! We're on Instagram @mrspress and @thewardrobecrisis, and on Twitter @mrspress
Head over to https://thewardrobecrisis.com/podcast/2021/9/7/ep-149-status-self-obsession-mental-health-amp-whats-really-controlling-how-we-act-will-storr to read yours and #bethechange
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Everyone's talking about climate action and social change - but Fashion is still carrying on like it's 1999. The velvet rope! Exclusivity! Snobbery and barriers to entry that lock many young designers with new ideas, out. Fashion weeks alone are massive carbon emitters, before we've even considered production. Pre-pandemic, the carbon footprint of all the media, buyers, models and designers going to the big four fashion weeks (NY, London, Milan & Paris) over a 12-month period, was enough to light up Times Square in New York for 58 years!
And you're no doubt familiar with fashion's unfairness, murky supply chains and lack of diversity.
Change is due.
But the industry seems determined to get back to business as usual. This week's guest, London-based Kenyan fashion designer Anyango Mpinga has other ideas. Digital presentations could change the game, she says. But that's just one piece of the puzzle. Fashion must find its heart again.
In this inspiring conversation, Anyango and host Clare Press talk purpose, service and giving back - and how, in Anyango's case, coming from a family of strong African women has shaped her. The designer shares her advice for independents trying to be as sustainable as possible, and the broader industry that needs to do better on diversity and inclusion. Big Fashion - take notes!
Head over to https://thewardrobecrisis.com/podcast/2021/8/16/ep-148-inspiring-fashion-anyango-mpinga to read yours and #bethechange
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Have you heard the one about throwing your clothes away being better for the planet than renting them?
In this Episode, we get the real story on the study out of Finland that spawned so many clickbait headlines, then ask a British retail legend about what's driving the fashion rental boom. We hear from a purpose-driven millennial founder about what her company is doing to ensure rental really is a greener fashion option than buying new clothes; and learn the secrets of eco-friendly dry cleaning (which... is actually wet - who knew?).
Featuring interviews with: Professor Jarkko Levänen of Lahti University of Technology; Jane Shepherdson, chair of My Wardrobe HQ; Victoria Prew, co-founder of HURR, and Dr Kyle Grant, founder of Oxwash.
Head over to https://thewardrobecrisis.com/podcast/2021/8/13/how-eco-friendly-is-fashion-rental-really to read yours and #bethechange
Thank you for listening to Wardrobe Crisis. Don't forget to hit subscribe!
Find us at wwww.thewardrobecrisis.com & on Instagram
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