The Rhythm Section: Sustainability in Fashion

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In my sustainability work I am constantly battling with misinformation, misunderstanding, and misappropriated intentions. The sad truth of the matter is that Sustainability is a mythical concept, and if we were to more accurately name it we could refer to it as “progress” or “systemic upgrades”, or perhaps even “responsible operations”, because the idea that any fashion brand could be truly sustainable operating in the market that we exist in today is unfathomable - they are not set up for success. From our production calendar to consumer expectations, we have built a system that rewards every possible bad decision a brand can make, and so when we label a brand as “Sustainable”, we are opening the door to scrutiny of the millions of ways this term is untrue.

But still, there are genuinely a lot of people out there looking for solutions regardless of the problematic terminology, so in this series I will try to help unlace the issues and concerns around some of the materials we encounter the most.

Plato said “the beginning is the most important part of the work”, and Batatunde Olatunji said, “the whole universe revolves around rhythm, and when we get out of rhythm is when we get into trouble”. 

So let’s start at the beginning, and we’ll keep the rhythm together. 

Starting with PCR materials. 

PCR Materials : What does it mean?

Let’s start with one of the most enigmatic and problematic issues about PCR Materials, which is that the term can mean two very different things.

It can refer to a composition of post-consumer recycled materials, meaning that the materials have been collected from the waste stream after use, and though we know well that waste management infrastructure worldwide is inadequate to handle our consumption and disposal habits, we can at least in some small way says that materials in this use case are receiving a second life. 

Where we see this most often is in water bottles or cardboard boxes with partial post-consumer recycled content, but if we want to abstract this out into other products, we could look to labels like Rentreyage, who use garments that have already passed through their first life, or Girlfriend, who makes activewear out of recycled plastic fabric, to then create new garments for new consumers. 

However, PCR can also refer to pre-consumer recycled materials, and it’s much more rare that a material supplier will happily advertise this production method. Typically, pre-consumer recycled materials are materials gathered from the production phase, meaning they have not made their way through a supply chain or found any type of life or use before being recycled. If we start with a fashion abstraction first, we know lots of amazing brands using pre-consumer recycled materials in some way or another; Batsheva makes almost everything out of deadstock fabrics that have never seen consumer use, and brands like Ace & Jig use the off-cuts from their garment production to create homewares, quilts, and more. Where we fall into muddier territory is with the producers of plastics and papers, who claim the acronym PCR on their products in order to market them as a “sustainable” choice, but any fashion production intern worth their salt can tell you that rerouting those materials back into your production line is not “sustainable”, it’s just common sense. 

Why is it important to know the difference between these two types of PCR? It will help you more easily verify sustainability claims made by people who are not genuine or transparent with their message, and know how to push back when that information is inadequate.

Why isn’t everything made from PCR materials?

The idea of endlessly routing waste back into the supply chain for recycling and reuse would be wonderful - that is, in fact, the sustainability dream, right? A closed loop. 

Recycled materials are not as strong as virgin materials - some common materials that we use in paper and plastics (and by the way, when I mention plastics I am talking both about plastic films and also plastic fabrics like polyester) can’t even make it through one round of recycling without losing all the properties that would make them worthy of resale.

Probably the best analogy I can offer for this, since we all spent last year cooped up in our homes re-learning how to feed ourselves, is to look at your own food. 

If you had some really great carrots and roasted them for your dinner tonight, you could save the leftovers for tomorrow. Tomorrow or the day after they are still edible, but you have to add them to a full salad in order for them to taste like anything worthy of a meal. Then you try to use them to cook a third meal and find they have lost everything you love about carrots, because carrots are not infinitely recyclable (I am stretching here but hopefully you are following). 

Most materials, with perhaps the exception of aluminum, are just like these carrots. They might be recycled once if you save the leftovers, but they will lose a lot of their properties after that first round of recycling, and after round one they’re pretty much done. They bring little to no value to the existing system aside from beefing up the “sustainability” chops of the producer, because they are leftovers.

Now, let’s bring the leftover carrots to Blue Hill at Stone Barns. I’ve actually never eaten there (I would love to though, someone please take me!), and I cannot imagine they serve a lot of leftovers, but hold on, I promise this analogy is going somewhere. Blue Hill decides to incorporate your leftovers into their menu, but in order to do so they need to add a lot of new stuff - seasoning, a puree, a chicken stock base, some brandy - in order to make it taste good enough to meet the expectations of their guest, who is paying a premium to eat something with a reputation. Your carrots end up being only about 10-20% of the total ingredients. 

Similarly, whenever recycled materials are being used, the producers of those materials need to add in a bunch of virgin material in order to give the resulting product the properties that their customers expect, especially because they will be upcharging for the “sustainability” factor. So, when you are holding a piece of plastic that claims to be made of PCR, it is likely to only be a minority percentage recycled materials, and is also likely to be predominantly virgin plastic. 

Also, because “recycled plastic” is socially such a highly-acceptable material in the eyes of the consumer, there is little to no regulation forcing these companies to report on their actual PCR percentages or certifications, which should be an absolute no-brainer requirement for any material. Further, if you participate in any sort of sustainability reporting metrics, you are essentially fudging the numbers for these materials unless you use one of the rare certified suppliers. 

The last but not least important thing to note is, your old carrots are worth so little and so highly compromise the performance properties of anything you make with them, most companies will continue to use virgin carrots simply out of a reliance on convenience and low cost in a largely unregulated global supply chain. 

I’m sorry you had to listen to this long-winded carrot analogy and I hope I didn’t lose you along the way. I wish I could have chosen a more direct link, but the reason I chose carrots is because most everyone reading this newsletter likely physically ingests more microplastics per week than they do carrots. 

And this actually brings me to a broader point about PCR materials. It is very attractive to talk about using recycled materials - and doubtlessly, we should be continuously investing in recycling infrastructure (which, in it’s present state, is basically non-existent). However, very little of our waste is effectively recycled to make its way back into any supply chain, and therefore - until that drastically changes - PCR materials are not a solution to fashion’s waste crisis. They are merely a small stepping stone, a very temporary Band-Aid on a problem that requires drastic change, quickly.

Most plastic was designed to be single use, so when we look for end solutions that do not deviate from the material itself, it is safe to say that we will be doom ourselves to design into the same system that got us to this horrendous state to begin with.

Yikes so… what are we supposed to do?

There are loads of materials on the market that are replacing conventional virgin materials in fabrics, films, papers, with the aim of reducing the footprint of the products we have come to rely on. And, as covered before, no single move will make the fashion industry sustainable in any area. These improvements are a slow dance, an English waltz, and if repeated on rhythm, step after step we will improve. So yes, upgrading materials is crucial, if not critical to this moment in time. If you are influential over a supply chain, become the advocate for this change. If you are a consumer, every brand you give money to should know about your sustainability priorities.

However, a material upgrade alone would miss a very important piece of the puzzle. Until these reliable virgin materials become less cheap and easy, they will continue to serve as the wait-and-see stalwart for companies whose footprints have the highest impact on our planet and its life. So yes, by all means, buy the (certified, vetted, inspected) sustainable alternative material, but also, we need to campaign as an industry to heavily tax the virgin materials that are destroying us. Make 100% virgin polyester so expensive that the only alternative is the sustainable version. Make conventional PE films so cost inhibitive that suppliers will have no choice but to offer you the alternatives that create a solution instead of a problem.

Though the chosen title itself is incredibly problematic, this is where the “Fashion Industry Czar” would be impactful domestically to move the needle on legislature that taxes these materials and thus leaves them essentially equal or less favorable in cost to less pollutive alternatives. 

This is also starting to happen at a local level in the form of EPR bills that pass responsibility for the end of life of a product onto the producer. Since we basically only municipally recycle plastic bottles, aluminum cans, and cardboard, that would leave nearly every aspect of the fashion industry open to paying for the safe return and disposal of materials. 

I guess what I’m saying is, just because this doesn’t affect you right now, doesn’t mean it won’t affect you in the very near future. 

And last, I will offer a step you can take as both an industry professional and a consumer. Most fashion and beauty supply chains are designed around appeasing the requirements of wholesale partners like Amazon, Nordstrom, Macy’s, etc, who have intricate requirements for content, packaging, labeling, etc, and breaking from those requirements means the vendor brand will incur fees and penalties. Let’s advocate to these wholesale partners, whose requirements dictate industry behavior, that they allow their vendors to explore alternative options without financial penalty.

If you made it this far - past the carrot analogy, past the calls to action - first of all kudos, but more importantly I would love to hear from you in the comments on what you would like to see from this series in the future. The next sustainable supply chain letter you receive will be about overseas human capital, because there is no sustainability if human life is treated like an expendable resource. I would love to hear from you on what you would like covered.

Thank you as always for reading… let’s keep the rhythm together!

Next week I will have a special guest interview to discuss incorporating Impact into our industry work.

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