Oxfam’s London Fashion Week Show - is this a step in the right direction for sustainable fashion?

With London Fashion Week being opened with secondhand clothes, we could be entering a new era of sustainable fashion

Lucy Reeves
9th March 2023
Image Credit: Instagram @Tasha Ghouri
Last Thursday, Oxfam opened London Fashion Week with a catwalk showing exclusively secondhand fashion, curated by Bay Garnett, huge advocate of thrifting fashion. The show, Fighting Fashion Poverty, was a collaboration between Oxfam and Ebay, the clothes being sourced from Oxfam’s huge warehouse and the looks being later sold on Ebay to raise funds.

The show brought together a range of issues surrounding the fashion industry. It provided a commentary on trends, as Barnett actively rejected styling according to trends and aimed to curate looks which reflect many different fashion styles. Most importantly it brought the spotlight to the destructive nature of the fashion industry: the high turnover of styles and the emergence of fast fashion. Fashion shows provide a stage for designers to exhibit new designs, new styles and new products. The Oxfam show contradicts this; rather than bringing new designs to the mainstream, it brings a new approach to enter into the world of fashion: reusing and rewearing existing clothes. 

Most importantly it brought the spotlight to the destructive nature of the fashion industry

The fast fashion industry is one of the most polluting sectors, causing huge amounts of environmental pollution and unnecessary waste, not to mention the human exploitation of workers in sweatshops. In highstreet brands, newer and cheaper styles appear every week, contributing to the unethical production methods, environmental pollution and the amount of clothing existing. As society is becoming more and more aware of this, shopping secondhand in charity shops or online on Depop, Vinted and Ebay has become standard practice - not only is it sustainable but it is cheaper, more exciting and creates a more unique wardrobe.

Image Credit: Instagram @ebay_uk

The Oxfam show at Fashion Week has been an important step to promote these practices, raising awareness of the issue whilst promoting an alternative to buying new. London Fashion Week gives the cause a global stage and places it amongst other luxury high-fashion labels which bring an audience and legitimise the value of this show on the same level as mainstream designers. The variety of celebrities featured on the catwalk further supports and popularises the concept of buying secondhand; their endorsement will have an impact on society and trends around which styles to wear. The inclusion of a catwalk featuring exclusively preowned clothes opens up the idea that other designers could include existing pieces or put more emphasis on reusing and recycling previous clothing in their new designs. 

A huge impact could be made if high-fashion designers also changed the way they design and present designs

That being said, could we imagine a fashion week with exclusively secondhand fashion? It sounds contradictory, as fashion weeks are used to present new collections and inspire new designs. Simply reusing clothes would defeat the point and could limit creativity in the industry. But catwalks are incredibly influential to the world of fast fashion, we see designs on the catwalk and a couple weeks later we see the same thing on the highstreet. Sustainability in the fashion industry relies on the scaling down of fast fashion. A huge impact could be made if high-fashion designers also changed the way they design and present designs.

Image Credit: Instagram @ebay_uk

I think that the popularity of secondhand fashion is only growing, social media being a driving force - watching TikTok charity shop hauls is incredibly satisfying and inspires you to go and find some absolute steals. In general society and especially in Gen Z culture, secondhand shopping has become mainstream - in this case a very good thing! But putting secondhand fashion in the context of high fashion, luxury brands and emerging international designers enables the idea of sustainability to intercept a different field. Its presence amongst these designers brings the issue of sustainability to the attention of people in this level of fashion, which will have an impact on the industry as a whole.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

ReLated Articles
magnifiercross
linkedin facebook pinterest youtube rss twitter instagram facebook-blank rss-blank linkedin-blank pinterest youtube twitter instagram
Copy link
Powered by Social Snap