Is it about materials and textiles?  Does it relate to the production and thus, fare wages and labour conditions? Is it about consumption patterns and therefore a renovation of the capitalist system? Or, on the contrary are we referring to a more moralist and personal approach?

If we go back to analysing the meaning of fashion we will all agree it was given birth to be at the hands of the aesthetical use of the “crème de la crème societè pariesienne”. It was, and still is, conceived as a means to express status, wealth and life philosophy. In other words, fashion is very much related to our relationship with ourself, the environment and system we live in: it´s a way of projecting our desired image on the mirror of others. However, above all these functional, structural and self-expressive benefits fashion provides us, it is a business, and as a business corporation that trades under a capitalist and globalised system…it behaves as one of them.

But it´s true that fashion is no longer only for the elite and should also not only be produced according to the non so-litistic labour  practices. If fashion started as an aspirational dynamic, meaning that the act of purchase is levered by the inner need to show others where we want to be categorised, for me, today, fashion has turned out to be IN-SPIRAL-TIONAL.

And I say IN-SPIRAL-TIONAL because it´s about being in, it follows a spiral-istic cycle and it’s as international as the globalised world we now live in. Therefore, ethical fashion can only be approached if we enhance both sides: DEMAND and OFFER, in a way that we make International fashion a way of co-operation between nations. .

If demand starts by creating a critical awareness in the consumers mind, implementing a confident and influencing demand that can set up the conditions… that is: a customer that knows and seeks what they want.

Then, offer starts at the very external sphere of the scenario… the system and the system gate-keepers. That is: political-legal restrictions, producers, media, brands and designers.

Although fashion and Co-operation & Development might seem at first sight an impossible mission , the truth is, the fashion industry is more than able to be sustainable. And I say this because, if the intentions where otherwise, its powerful industry and our constant desire to consume, for whatever reason you may name, could be used to mobilize the same enlarged sums of money in a more proportionally distributed way. Fashion is nowadays democratised and this simply means that the colour palettes are wider than it has ever been. Call it black, call it green, call it blue..but the truth is, you choose what you choose.. there will always be, a fashion philosophy for you.

In conclusion, only if both sides get involved in the concerning issue and inter-influence each other following a trickle-across tendency,  we can start considering the ethics of fashion…or the start of ethical fashion…

TO BE CONTINUOUS , for sure………………by A.H

LinkINg: http://fashioninganethicalindustry.org/static/sewingmachine.html