An analysis of the impact of social media in fashion and consumerism.
By: Emma 7.2
An image of a 'Shein Haul' (a mass purchase of Shein clothes).
No one can deny the power of social media in our lives. None of us can escape it, and since the moment we first opened TikTok, Instagram, or Snapchat, we were cast under the spell of social media and anything that comes under it, including the world of fashion.
Social media is a great place for fashion businesses to share their work with the public and gain more customers. In fact, social media has become the number one platform for fashion labels to share their latest creations.
Many of us know about fashion week. Fashion week is a week dedicated to fashion, where big designers such as Prada, Yves Saint Laurent, Dior, and many others, gather up to show off their new collections on a runway. Fashion week takes place in Paris, Milan, New York, and London. I have been doing some research, and an article written by Vogue says ‘TikTok is taking over fashion week’. Is this true?
I think it is. TikTok is convincing. We might see an influencer or celebrity in a TikTok on our For You page, and we might like the clothes they are wearing, so we go find the clothes that they are wearing and buy them, because we think that buying them is going to make us seem trendier. Many brands and designer labels are acknowledging this and are using social media and influencers to promote their products.
Let’s look at an example of this. Most of us know about a brand called SHEIN. SHEIN is the most downloaded fashion app as of this day. They have made over 10 BILLION US dollars in the past year. Apart from them using all these social media platforms, they are super quick to get items on the shelves. It only takes them 3 days MAXIMUM to design the item of clothing, make it, and upload it to the website. As a matter of fact, SHEIN uploads over 700 new things to their website a day. SHEIN is what we call fast fashion. Sounds great, right? Well, let’s take a deeper look into this.
Fast fashion brands have a reputation for copying the designs of small businesses, and independent designers. Workers are on the minimum wage and working for many hours a day under poor conditions. Some of these brands even make children under the age of 12 work. Fast fashion doesn’t sound so good anymore, does it? Well, it’s about to get even worse.
Clothing production contributes to more climate change than flying and shipping combined. Unutilized clothing ends up in land fields. They also contribute to the pollution of water and land due to the methods used in manufacturing. Fast fashion is responsible for around 8% of the carbon emissions worldwide. It’s time we act, and we think about the impact of our choices, the bigger picture!
“By thinking of the garments, we wear as short-term tools rather than long-term investments, we contribute to wasteful consumption that led us towards drastic climate change,” taken from an independent clothing brand called WOLF&BADGER.
Why don’t you start trying alternatives to fast fashion, such as thrifting? It’s never too late.
Comments