Do you want to ruin the environment just to be trendy?
Consumers spend too much money on clothes, shoes, electronic and other things. We live in a scary development where the "use & throw"mentality is huge. If we get tired of one garment, we throw it, and then by something else. This leads to increaset production, and more work in the poor countries. Because it is the poor countries that controls a big part of the textile industry world wide. This is because it is cheap labor. But for what price?
The norwegian newspaper "Aftenposten" made a series called "Sweatshop". In this series norwegian youths are visiting some textile factories in Cambodia, and meet textile workes. The people they meet are working very hard, in countless hours, without high enough income. How will the people there survive, if we don`t?
Large part of the things we buy have plastic as packaging, or had before it came to the store. Did you know that 50% of all plastic produced in the world, is only used once? Or that you need as much water to make one t-shirt, as to fill a whole bath tub? Besides everything we buy gets transportet from place to place, something that`s not sustainable. This may not cost much for the fashionistas, but it costs a lot for our environment.
To avoid more damage to the environment we can take advantage of redesign or reuse. If we use the same materials over and over again, we don`t need to produce as much as we do now. We can use paper as an example. Most people throw the newspaper after reading it. But, instead you can use the paper as extra shoe soles or as a creative wallpaper, and of course much else.
Reuse and redesign also causes less production, and less work for the textile workers. In the same time it results in that the textile workers in Bangladesh, for example, gets fired, and loses their income. However if the production of clothing dosen`t reduce, our planet will get destroyed because the CO2 emissions are too high. Therefore I mean that reuse and redesign is a part of the sustainable development.
Economy also play a part in the reuseable world. You may be on a budgett one month, and need a new skirt. You can use the old summerdress you had planned to throw away, and the only thing you need is a scissor and some thread. Then your old dress becomes your dreamskirt. So easy is it to save yourself some money and help environment a little bit.
From my point of view reusing and redesign seems like a good thing to do, but the problem is that many people are too lazy and they are "lacking" creativity. Therefore they buy something new instead. Despite the lack of creativity from my part, I was able to redesign an old Norway glass (see pictures below). I found inspiration from the internet, and thought sustainable through the process. A person who works with this exactly is Jenny Skavlan. Her job is to redesign old garments into something new and exciting. She sells the "new" garments on her own reuse-app "Tise". Jenny also had a cloting line with Bikbok. In addition she is a source of motivation among young adults in terms of redesign and reuse.
All in all I mean everyone should make use of the things they have, and don`t waste money on unnessesary things. Using redesign and reuse you can contribute to reduce the climate changes, and help the sustainable development. Reuse is good for your own economy, creativity and the environment.
Does people in Asia need to work that hard, just so you can have the perfect outfit in a birthday? No! So think twice before you buy stuff you don`t need.
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