3 Clever Innovations making Fashion Sustainable

The Fashion industry isn't an obvious cause of harm to the environment. If you were to ask most people they would immediately point to cars, electrical devices, airlines and farming as major contributors to harmful green house gases. The majority of people don't quite know how harmful the fashion industry is to the environment. And they need to wake up.

Unfortunately, the fashion industry is one of the major polluting industries in the world. The production and distribution of the crops, fibres, and garments used in fashion all contribute to differing forms of environmental pollution, including water, air, and soil pollution. The textile industry is the second greatest polluter of local freshwater in the world. Some of the main factors that contribute to this industrial caused pollution are the vast overproduction of fashion items, the use of synthetic fibres, and the agriculture pollution of fashion crops.

People nowadays are too obsessed with buying whatever the cool new brand is and they quickly discard clothes of an older fad. The amount of new garments bought by Americans has tripled since the 1960s. Which is frightening.

However, its not all doom and gloom. They're are some incredibly talented people walking this Earth and they have come up with some inspired ways to improve the fashion industry.

• Vegan Leather

One of the other ways technology is making fashion sustainable is also saving the lives of animals, too.

We all know that ‘vegan leather‘ can often be a euphemism for ‘plastic crap’. But several companies are now making innovative vegan leathers from 100% natural materials in laboratories. For example, Modern Meadow produces leather from yeast cells that are fermented in ways similar to beer making.

The result is collagen, the protein that gives skin its elasticity – and which can be made into a product that closely imitates leather. The pieces vary in colour, thickness and texture, and the fabric can be used for a variety of purposes, including clothing, shoes, handbags, car and plane interiors and even furniture.

Raising cattle itself is so environmentally damaging, but producing leather is even worse, due to highly toxic tanning and dyeing processes, but apart from the environmental harm, there’s also huge wastage in the industry – up to half of a cowhide can be wasted due to imperfections, and with alligator and crocodile skin, it’s even worse, with up to 90% of the material wasted because of the need for a perfect pattern.

Business consulting firm Grand View Research (GVR) has predicted the global faux leather market will hit $85bn by 2025 due to the lower cost of producing animal-free products along with the increasing number of consumers opting for animal-free materials – and that’s a beautiful thing, if you ask me!

• Clothes made from Food

A German microbiology-student by the name of Anke Domaske had a great idea: she used milk, tea and coffee beans in her ‘Grow Your Own Clothes’ project at university, and it blew her professors away.

So much so, in fact, that she was encouraged to launch a company called Qmilk which produces fabrics not only for the fashion industry, but also for home and car furnishings. Cloth made from Qmilk fibre is very soft and provides a comfortable fit, but that’s not all: the textile also provides reduced bacterial growth and skin-sensory properties, which make it suitable for any activity in any climate.

• Lab Grown Diamonds

Technology is making fashion sustainable in the realm of accessories, too: namely lab grown diamonds and gemstones.

One company leading the way is Lark and Berry, who proudly create high quality lab-grown diamonds using a process called Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD). In this, a diamond seed is placed into a high pressure chamber with a plasma formed with Methane and Hydrogen, and is then heated to upwards of 2200 degrees Fahrenheit.

The gases attach to the seed and the carbon crystal grows for up to a month (longer for higher carat weight diamonds). Once the crystal is formed, it is removed and sent to a diamond cutter to get the maximum size and brilliance possible.

Lab-grown diamonds require far, far less energy to produce than a natural diamond. Although energy is required to produce the high pressure and temperatures required with a lab grown diamond, it is still approximately a third or less of the energy required to mine a diamond, and of course, less energy translates to less fuel and pollution.

Also, many of the most reputable lab-grown vendors are also using large amounts of solar and wind generated power, and of course, lab grown gemstones and diamonds never rip up the Earth, destroying plants and animal habitats, the way mining does.

Why is knowing this stuff important??

Good question. People need to be more aware of where the products they buy come from. You shouldn't be so trusting of big companies the majority of which have terrible track records of sustainable fashion.

People need to realise that there are sustainable alternatives. Hopefully by advertising and promoting these clever innovations we can start a trend towards these more sustainable choices and possibly inspire more brilliant technologies to improve this industry.

Only when we show that we won't tolerate other harmful options will corporate giants move towards these better choices.

I'll leave you with this quote:)

References:

1. En.wikipedia.org. 2020.'Environmental Impact Of Fashion'. Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_fashion

[Accessed 29 March 2020].

2. Morley, C., 2020. '6 ways Technology is making Fashion Sustainable'. Available at: https://eluxemagazine.com/fashion/when-technology-meets-sustainable-fashion/

[Accessed 29 March 2020].

3. Youmatter. 2020.'Sustainability - What Is It? Definition, Principles And Examples'. Available at: https://youmatter.world/en/definition/definitions-sustainability-definition-examples-principles/

[Accessed 29 March 2020].