Stay with me on this, but outfit repeating is now cool. Wearing the same clothes more than once has been deemed bad over time, but many of us are now proudly stepping out in outfits we have worn before. Call this growth, but this cause has sustainable impacts and is quite a movement at the moment.
Many are calling to end the ‘wear it once’ culture, as this promotes fast fashion and this year there has been increased backlash against it. Is it OK to repeat outfits shouldn’t be an appropriate question anymore.
If you were to look through your Instagram posts, would you see the same outfit more than once? We seem to subconsciously worry about re-wearing outfits, especially if they’ve already appeared on social media. But why do we think this way?
The rise of sustainable brands is all over our feeds this year, but is this enough to make us ditch fast consumption?
Do We Still Dress Up?
This year we haven’t really been able to dress up and go out for an evening (depending on where you live). Lockdowns and restrictions have forced many of us into a ritual of comfortable loungewear and old t-shirts.
This repetition of comfy clothes shows us that we don’t actually need to be continuously buying clothes, but yet we still do! Most of us wince in horror at the thought of posting our repeated lockdown looks on social media, however, it proves clothes can be re-worn without being seen.
Obviously, when it comes to dressing up for a night out or a social event, we like to make an impression and feel good about ourselves. However, it can sometimes feel like getting spotted in a previously worn look is a criminal offense. Luckily, this ‘wear it once’ culture is beginning to fade, perhaps due to lockdowns, as there are more options for conscious design and sustainable stores.
Learning how to style clothes you already have is key to conscious fashion. Besides, when you invest in clothes made with love and renewable materials, you want to wear them more as they look good and last longer.
Why It’s Better To Re-wear
When we stop wearing clothes and throw them out, they go to landfills. Tons and tons of textiles waste end up there every day, and it does not biodegrade quickly. The fashion industry is slowly taking steps to become more eco-friendly, but we should all do our best to play our part in the process.
Unfortunately, the environmental impacts of fashion are not positive. For example, in cotton production, water is heavily used and also wasted. To combat this, it is important to monitor how much you buy cotton products (such as denim), could you make do with the pair of jeans you own now? Do you really need to buy another pair? It’s simple questions like these that we need to ask ourselves. Examining our own shopping habits may be uncomfortable, but they’re a necessary step to take to be more eco-friendly.
Shopping Sustainably
There are many ways to make your clothes purchases count, from sustainable shops to buying second hand – the slow fashion options are endless. These are great for those who can’t help but want new clothes but don’t want to harm the environment. Buying cheap clothes looks excellent for one wear, but the clothing will fall apart quickly, and the workers may not have ethical treatment. Great places to start shopping are thrift stores or specific clothing brands that source organic or reused textiles!
If you feel creative, you can even start upcycling your clothes! Upcycling is a great trend where you take an existing item of clothing and turn it into something new. This could be just cropping a t-shirt to completely deconstructing a garment and making it unrecognizable. If you don’t want to re-wear an outfit and feel up for a challenge, experiment with upcycling to produce yourself a whole new wardrobe. This is great if you are in lockdown again. Use your time to be creative and stylish at the same time!
Outfits Repeating and The Future of Fashion?
Telling people to repeat outfits may make it sound like trends are dead, and we will be stuck wearing the same clothes forever. That’s not true!
Outfit repeating doesn’t mean you can’t shop ever again. It just helps us focus on what we own and makes us think about if we need to buy anymore. Of course, you can buy more!
But maybe not as much and not as often, it will depend from person to person, but we can all only do our best at the end of the day. Shopping for ethical and sustainable clothing is totally fashionable too!