In between shopping roughly 10,000 Black Friday sales online and hopefully coming up with creative uses for all of your items, you might suddenly realize a wonderful thing: the week has been a roller coster of fashion codes emphasizing sustainability. Today is not an exception, it’s Day 26! Put on a playlist, grab your snack, and let’s do this!
I’m someone who still wears garments sewn or purchased over a few years ago, who preserves my mum’s vintage pieces like a museum curator. So, in the sphere of slow fashion, you can always find my name there. WHY? I’m a strong admirator for SDG 11— Make cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable.
(little voiceover: we can all make a difference by being more thoughtful as consumers)
The more I repeat my outfits, the more I realize that nobody actually cares or noticed. I don’t pay much attention to my friend’s outfits but even if they did wear an outfit again, who cares?! If anything, it relieves the collective societal pressure on us all and it’s much better for the environment. It’s important to stop viewing old clothes as lesser clothes and give them some credits for all the things they have been with you through, lol.
Whether or not someone has money, clothing is a powerful tool, wielded to emulate wealth and status. However, most people’s bank accounts cannot keep up with the constant influx of new trends from designer labels.( a sad truth)
This only widens the gap between the rich and the poor, a chasm fast fashion brands now happily – and greedily – fill.
Social media may have accelerated this problem, but I believe it has also created a place to promote an alternative narrative.( just like we’re doing now)
In the sustainable space, the conversation around the stigma of outfit repeating has been bubbling for a while. This constant pressure to wear new things is at the core of the damaging fast fashion.
Sustainability activist, broadcaster and slow fashion campaigner Venetia La Manna brought back #OOOTD (a social media initiative encouraging people to share their “old outfit of the day” – an antidote to the #OOTD fashion hashtag.
The hashtag has garnered over 40,000 posts, and a quick scroll through the Instagram feed shows just how many people are using social media to celebrate what’s already in their wardrobe. The more we love our clothes, the longer they last, and the longer they stay out of landfills.
The temptation of newness always holds excitement. However, the ease of getting dressed when you have a smaller wardrobe, trusted outfits and a clearer sense of your style is satisfying in another way. For instance, while some royals do repeat outfits, Kate Middleton surely beats them all.
Beauty + Brains + Consciousness indeed!
If you’re looking to embrace outfit repeating more frequently and slow down your approach to fashion, now is the perfect time to start.
BEAR IN MIND
1. Just because celebrities rarely repeat outfits does not mean you shouldn't either.
Get your facts right. These celebs, while in comparison still have larger closets than you, seldom recycle outfits because their stylists choose and provide their clothes for them. For these stars whose lives are chronicled daily by the papparazzi, it only makes sense for them to avoid being photographed in the same outfit each time. This leads me to my second point...
2. Who's going to see me in this look, anyway?
If I put together an outfit that I like, I make sure to give it the magic it deserves. It may sound shallow, but I want as many people as possible to see me slay my look. I figured the number of times I wore that particular outfit doesn't matter; however, the number of people who've seen and appreciated it does.
3. Mind the public posts.
Perhaps the trickiest part is if the outfit makes its way onto your (or someone else's) social media accounts. Once it's been Instagrammed, it's history. But that doesn't mean you can't recycle your clothes. Just space out your posts a bit, yes?
4. Restyle and rewear.
This a simple solution to expertly repeating your clothes, style the pieces differently. Here's where fashion truly gets more fun and exciting. You get to flex your creative muscles and think of new ways to wear your clothes. And oh, don't underestimate the power of accessorizing! Quote me anywhere, honestly it makes such a difference.
5. Wear what works for you.
Let's abandon the idea that repeating clothes should be something to be ashamed of. They're made to be washed and reworn, anyway. You wouldn't purchase an article of clothing only to waste its cost-per-wear value, right? (Especially if it was worth a lot.) Keep wearing what you love. Besides, there's always this boost of confidence we get whenever we wear an outfit that we already know works for us. Embracing outfit-repeating will not only help reduce the stigma caused by sexism, consumerism and classism, it will also reduce our carbon footprint. According to Patagonia Chief executive and environmental activist Rose Marcario, “The single best thing we can do for the planet is to keep our stuff in use longer.” Actively wearing a garment for just nine months longer can reduce its environmental impacts by 20–30%.( SDG 11)
Repeating outfits is a normal thing to do, you shouldn't feel compelled to trivialize the maximum potential of your clothes. Feel free to repeat your outfit for only as long as hygiene allows.