Fashion

H&M works to undo “fast fashion” harms

By Chaeyoon Baek

Surbhi Chaudhari was on her way to the cash register with a white shirt and blue denim jeans from H&M’s 12-year-old line of clothing made of recycled synthetic fabric or natural ones like cotton, linen and wool.

“I try to buy sustainable clothes, and I avoid something which is not organic,”  said Chaudhari, calling herself a regular shopper at the international retailer and motioning toward the clothes draped over her arm. 

When she’s not buying items from the conscious line, she chooses H&M items she can wear over and over again, including basic T-shirts and pants that aren’t trendy and likely to fall quickly out of fashion.

Sweden-based H&M is among retailers that are bowing to buyers who increasingly are concerned about the impact of their purchases on the environment. Compared to 2020, the amount of recycled material used in H&M’s products tripled from 5.8% to 17.9%, while use of natural materials rose from 58.7% to 62.1%, according to the company’s 2021 sustainability report.

A Vogue magazine Audience & Sustainable Fashion Tracker survey of roughly 6,100 people in the United States and 11 other countries found a 4% increase — from 65% to 69% — in the proportion of people who say that sustainable fashion is important.

The Baker Retail Center at the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business has released “The State of Consumer Spending: Gen Z’s Passion for Sustainability Boosts the Resale Market,” indicating that some are choosing not to buy cheaper-quality, trendy, so-called fast fashion that stores similar to H&M helped to popularize. Such environmentally harmful micro trending fashions go out of style pretty fast and, in one way or another, end up getting tossed.

“We … know that it is really detrimental to our environment, but it’s hard to break away from sometimes, I think, because of how fast trends move in these days anyway,” said Perci Huskin, 17 , a Floridian who was visiting New York City and shopping at East Village Thrift Shop. A thrift-shopper since she was a little girl, she’s watched thrifting go mainstream, including on Instagram.

Some, including researchers at the University of Alabama at Birmingham Institute for Human Rights, who have documented low wages of fast fashion factory workers in poor countries, are noting what they say is a growing shift away from fast fashion 

“I’ve been more aware of it. It actually has changed my opinion about not going to, like, clothing stores that aren’t as sustainable,” said Isabella Guerrero, breaking from shopping recently at H&M in Manhattan.  Earlier this year, she first learned about the harms of fast fashion through social media.

Colombian tourist Isabella Artoto, who also was shopping at H&M recently, said she noticed that thrifting was trending on TikTok. She knew less about sustainable fashion, though, and nothing about the H&M conscious line. 

“I really know what is fast fashion,” Artoto said. “In school, I have to learn about it, so I’ve done the research and all of that.”

Rita Mcrae had no clue that there was even a conscious line in H&M. She could care less, she said. “No, I’mma keep on with what I do,” said Mcrae, who buys fast fashion for her two 20-something daughters.

For herself, Chaudari said she’ll continue to add some sustainable items to her wardrobe. “If everyone cuts down a little bit on the non-organic stuff, it would make a little more difference.”