Hello Reader,
“A la mode”, “modisch”, “alla moda”, “fashionable” – up to date with current style or trend. FASHION. We have all been trained to try and keep up with the current colors, cuts and styles. We feel good when we are in fashion and awkward at best when we are out.
We’ve been taught to never judge a book by its cover, while trying to adopt coverings that “make a good impression”, quite the contradiction. So we dress, we dress well, we dress down and we dress for the occasion.
The fashion industry knows that the more we care about our looks the more clothing they sell. They trained us to seasonal looks, and then they revved up the cycle and created fast fashion where style changes every few weeks. And we consume and consume and consume mountains of inexpensive clothing that makes us feel great for a moment.
Dancing on the end of this string we lose our ability to be confident in the indelible self, the enduring self.
If this is not bad enough, fast and cheap clothing has created mountains of waste by over production and disposal of out of date styles.
Our obsession with fast fashion is toxic.
Still, we all do want to express ourselves, to celebrate our uniqueness with our clothes and costumes. There is nothing wrong with that but it’s a fundamental fallacy that we need to follow a brand to do that. The rise of second hand fashion shows us that we can engage in our personal style and expression without being on the fashion hamster wheel.
Thinking through the idea of a growing second hand fashion industry, it’s clear that unlike the products of fast fashion where clothes are made as cheaply as possible, a well made, good wearing piece of clothing can be resold again and again, creating a cycle of earnings for second hand clothing retailers without the negative environmental impacts.
Who knew that one of the ways to fight the climate crisis would be to buy quality second hand clothing, and then sell it on when we are done with it. The good news is that many people are waking up to this idea. Quality and sustainability are suddenly fashionable and that is a trend we all should follow.
In this weeks PROOF we will explore sustainable fashion and the ways that you can shift your dollars from toxic consumption to a closed loop cycle of virtue that gives us a vast amount of freedom to really be yourself.
We hope you enjoy this weeks PROOF. Please share it with your friends.
Join us as we help to invent and invest in a sustainable future.
Michael Shaun Conaway
& The Bold.ly NOW Team
Proof 33 – The Future of Fashion
In the News:
Can Made-To-Order Be The Future Of Sustainable Fashion?
3 Things You Might Not Know About Fast Fashion – Causeartist
The majority of us want to ditch fast fashion ‘for good’, says study
World Environment Day 2021: Five Ways to Adopt Sustainable Fashion
Sustainable fashion on a budget
Is DIY the Future of Ethical and Sustainable Fashion?
How Vanish are inspiring us to make the clothes we love last a lifetime
Organizations Generating a Thriving Future: Candiani Denim
Candiani Denim was established in 1938 in a tiny town near Milano and is a family-run company ever since.
In 75 years of experience the enterprise grew to become the World’s finest and most sustainable denim mill creating the fabrics that gave birth to the Premium Denim Industry.
Today Candiani is known as the greenest textile company in the blue World and produces for the most prestigious names in the market, such as Levi’s, Lucky Brand, Hugo Boss, Madewell and J. Crew.
See the company’s website here, and read more about the company here.
What We’re Watching : Where the future of fashion is headed
What is the future of fashion and where is the fashion industry heading to? What kind of future do fashion pioneers think of and how do they try to change the way of thinking about fashion? A documentary about the future and a new way of approach to fashion.
Backlight shows five future fashion pioneers who make their industry future-proof by experimenting with new fabrics, reuse and hi-tech design. Their ‘fashion of the future’ goes far beyond sustainability alone. They also force us to look differently at beauty and the role that clothing plays in our lives.
(Note – turn on subtitles to understand the people speaking in Dutch.)
What We’re Reading – Unraveled
A groundbreaking chronicle of the birth–and death–of a pair of jeans, that exposes the fractures in our global supply chains, and our relationships to each other, ourselves, and the planet.
A sprawling, deeply researched, and provocative tour-de-force, Unraveled is not just the story of a pair of pants, but also the story of our global economy and our role in it. Told with piercing insight and unprecedented reporting, Unraveled challenges us to use our relationship with our jeans–and all that we wear–to reclaim our central role as citizens to refashion a society in which all people can thrive and preserve the planet for generations to come.
You can read an excerpt here, and listen to a discussion with author Maxine Bédat here.
What We’re Listening to – Conscious Chatter
Conscious Chatter opens the door to conversations about our clothing + the layers of stories, meaning and potential impact connected to what we wear. It reimagines the narrative around sustainability, explores the importance of resourcefulness, questions conscious consumerism, and works to deconstruct how oppressive systems impact the sustainable fashion space.
In Episode 237 listen to a discussion with Ben Mead, the Managing Director of Hohenstein Institute USA, about green chemistry and the OEKO-TEX® Association which attempts to certify green practices in the textile supply chain.
May this information inspire you to generate a thriving future for humanity and a thriving life for yourself. For more resources please check out our Podcast and Youtube channel.
-The Bold.ly Now Team
BOLD.LY NOW is a movement of co-creative up-levelers who have a burning desire to step free of our collapsing world & take the most daring leap forward to a thriving world.
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PROOF is a Generative Futures Initiative Project
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Generating a Thriving Future for All
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