There are many different ways to embrace the slow fashion lifestyle, some of them requiring investment of money and others a change of mindset. But the easiest way to start is with your laundry. These 5 tips will make your clothes last longer, embrace slow fashion and help save the planet too!
You might have seen ‘slow fashion’ become a bit of a buzzword lately. But what is slow fashion?
Good on You says “Put simply, slow fashion is the opposite of fast fashion. It encompasses awareness and an approach to fashion that considers the processes and resources required to make clothing. It advocates for buying better-quality garments that will last longer, and values fair treatment of people, animals, and the planet along the way.”
How can one participate?
1: Wash your clothes on a cold cycle
Washing your clothes on a cold cycle can prevent the breaking down of dyes, colour transfer, wrinkling and shrinking of your clothes (we’ve all been there, and it’s devastating!)
According to Ocean Clean Wash, micro plastics contribute to 35% of all plastic in the ocean. When you do a load of laundry with hot water, microfibres – tiny plastic fibres – like polyester and nylon shed more easily from your clothes into the water.
Running your washing machine on a cold wash can use up to 10x less energy than a warm cycle says Energywise, saving an extra 20-40c on every single wash.
Saving the environment, money and making your clothes last longer – can’t go wrong!
2: Buy clothes that are easy to wash and have care instructions that you know you are going to follow
Following along from the first tip, checking the care label in your clothes and making sure it’s a material that you are actually going to be bothered to handwash(if that’s what it needs) is an important factor in making your clothes last longer.
Some of the easiest materials to wash are:
- Cotton: It’s dry-cleanable, machine washable, and can go in the tumble drier.
- Linen: Gentle machine wash, cool tumble dry, and can be ironed
- Polyester/Synthetics: Machine washable, and low-temperature tumble drying but make sure to check the care labels first!
3: Wash your clothes less!
In 2014, the CEO of Levi’s Chip Burr when questioned how often you should wash your jeans said “not very often, just take a sponge or a toothbrush and a little bit of detergent and spot clean instead.”
This one might make you want to screw your face up but we as a society are washing our clothing far too much. In the study ‘Nobody was dirty’ run in 2013 and published in the Journal of Consumer Culture a group of people wore their jeans five days a week for 3 months in a bid to interrupt the mindset that we have about washing our clothes. Many of the participants “communicated surprise at how easy it was” and “demonstrated that the expectation of not washing was more repulsive than the actuality, hinting that there may be a perception barrier to changing practices.”
Next time you go to throw your jeans in the wash, maybe do your own little experiment and see how you go washing your jeans less often.
Spritzing them with a little bit of white vinegar and water mix and leaving them out to dry in the air will freshen them up.
3: Treat stains as fashion emergencies!
The easiest way to minimise the amount of washing you do in your machine is by treating stains as fashion emergencies and using a laundry bar or stain remover pen to get stains out straight away.
Investing in a laundry bar to help you spot clean, or a few common household items like vinegar, lemon and dishwashing liquid can have you on your way to getting stains out like a pro (or if you are anything like me, just don’t wear white!)
4: Use laundry wash bags for delicates
We all know how expensive underwear can be, especially a supportive bra that not only looks good but feels good to wear. The best way to make these investments last is too use a laundry wash bag. A wash bag is usually a small mesh bag you put your delicates in that zips up so they are more protected from the spin cycle and prevents stretching, ripping and tangling of your lovely undergarments.
If you don’t want to invest in a specific bag for your delicates, the mesh bags that you use for your produce at the grocery store can work fine too – thrifty! – just make sure to clasp your bras up to avoid the hooks getting caught on the loosely woven mesh.
5: Don’t overload your washing machine
This tip not only helps your clothes last longer, but also keeps your washing machine in good nick too!
Clothes need a certain amount of room when they are being washed so they actually get clean. Overloading your washing machine prevents the agitation cycle from working at its best and results in clothes that aren’t washed properly at the end of the wash and could end up with ‘detergent splotches’ on them because the water and the detergent didn’t mix properly.
A top tip is to leave a quarter of the space in your washing machine free when you are putting clothes in there, you should never be pushing down on the clothes to make more room.
