I’m sure that every one of us has enjoyed the pleasures of shopping, whether it is physically at the stores or ordering your parcels online. For many people, it is considered as a way of treating themselves, just spending their free time or even done regularly as a hobby. People do not shop for need anymore, they shop for pleasure. We at KORLEKIE believe that everyone should still be able to treat themselves, but what we would like to highlight is the option for doing so while being conscious about the effects on the environment and societies around us.
Throughout the last decade, the fashion industry has been taken over by an extraordinary phenomenon – fast fashion. The concept of fast fashion brands is highly profitable, making businessmen like Amancio Ortega, the founder of Zara, one of the richest men in the world. However, when looking at it in more detail, fast fashion is a production and selling system that uses the cheapest resources available to create products as fast as possible, following the latest fashion trends straight from the catwalk. As a result, good-looking but disposable garments are made that are encouraged to be exchanged against new ones after just a year, or even quicker.
All that is enhanced by marketing and social media, where the good appearance of the products is being shown to a global audience. Many people think it is normal to replace your clothes every year without knowing what kind of crucial effects it has on the environment. As just one terrifying example, each year there are around 80 billion new garments produced, from which 80% end up in landfill or being incinerated. If you really start thinking about it, that is far from normal. The brands are creating products just to fulfil the needs for profits and good appearance, creating an endless pile of waste as they go.
But there is another way to shop and produce: following the slow fashion movement. Easily put, slow fashion is the opposite of fast fashion, it relies on the principles of creating garments slowly with fewer seasons, using high-quality materials, respecting the garment workers during the process and resulting in the creation of long-lasting timeless products. With this kind of production, there is no need to exchange your clothes annually, but rather invest in timeless and versatile styles that could be worn for years, if not decades. It is basically going back in time to the era of our grandparents, where winter coats and party gowns were passed on to your children to be worn for another generation, or even two.
As this great picture from the Fair Cottage webpage illustrates, slow fashion movement expands into several elements. For manufacturing, it means producing garments in smaller amounts, using local artisans who create high-quality products and use sustainable materials. Instead of mass production, small batches of clothes are created that last for years. Additionally, the manufacturers should provide a safe working environment, try to lower their carbon emissions and protect and profit the environment throughout the whole production process.
For consumers, the slow consumption advice is to buy less, invest in good quality and longlasting products, choose timeless and versatile styles made of sustainable or organic materials and reuse or recycle the garments that already exist in your closet. Purchasing used or vintage clothes or repurposing your old garments is also a highly effective and environmentally-conscious way to create fresh pieces for your wardrobe. In summary, slow fashion is a way of creating and consuming clothes while respecting the planet we live in, the people around us and still create profit in a responsible way. All this helps to create less waste and make more use of your existing clothes, resulting in reducing the harmful effects fashion has on the environment.
After all this, we want to explain to you how KORLEKIE is taking part in the movement of slow fashion. You might be already familiar that all of our products are made-to-order, which means they are created personally for the customer, leaving no excessive stock that would go to waste. Throughout every step of the production process of the garments, we rely on sustainable and slow fashion principles: designing timeless styles that are not trend-driven, using only the highest quality materials in the production, celebrating true artisans and their craftsmanship while making sure they have ethical work conditions and highlighting the communities who help us do all that. KORLEKIE loves slow fashion, creating extraordinary garments while minimising our footprint to the environment. Fashion is beautiful, but slow fashion is truly gorgeous!
