As we get nearer to Earth Day, I’ve been thinking about the fashion industry a lot more. One thing that I’ve been thinking about is deadstock. Deadstock is a term used for many kinds of fabric. Tulle and chiffon can be deadstock, as can leather. Deadstock fabric, by definition, is fabric from a textile mill or designer that has been either left over from a project or completely unused. Most of the time, deadstock can be thought of as the scraps left over from that pretty skirt you saw at Target the other day, but sometimes, designers leave over entire bolts of fabric that can’t be used for other projects. It can also be fabric intended for a specific project or buyer from textile mills that could have been unintentionally altered during the manufacturing process, which has now been rendered unable to be used by the buyer for said intended projects. Now, these scraps and mistake pieces of fabric would normally go to the trash, then into landfills where it would take centuries to break down if it were polyester or some other polymer-based textile, but, taking and selling them as deadstock pieces allow smaller designers to help out the environment by using these pieces to create a completely new garment, one with a completely unique vision, since no two scraps are ever the same. Using deadstock pieces, designers are able to reuse fabrics and keep larger producers from contributing to landfills.
Polymers are normally classified in the textile industry as any natural or synthetic substance made from large molecules that are combined from several smaller units called monomers. Monomers have the ability to group together and form a long chain through a process called polymerization. Natural polymers can include starches and proteins, things you’d normally find in potatoes as that starchy white residue left over on your knife when you slice them up, or in meats and poultry as proteins. Synthetic polymers are composed of petroleum oil (which you can get from the fossils of ancient marine life or zooplankton, and is also sometimes called crude oil) which is manmade and comes from engineers and scientists who have to refine it before use. Petroleum oil is then turned into things like Teflon (which contains PFAS, dangerous chemicals for the human body when consumed), epoxy, polyethylene, and polyester. The most common polymers used in the textile industry are usually composed of nylon and polyester-based polymers. Things like wool, silk, cotton, and cashmere are natural products, while things like acetate, rayon, olefin, polyester, and nylon are synthetics. We’ve been using natural hair and textiles to make clothes for millenia, but with the introduction of animal cruelty programs like PETA (which I fully support, by the by) we have had to move to synthetics. The only thing with this switch, though, is while it takes away from animals being farmed for their furs or hides, it also creates a bigger problem for the environment as a whole. Synthetic fabrics are prized for their lower price point and their durability, but this durability comes as a problem. With synthetics being so durable, nature cannot break them down as easily as natural fabrics. This means that they accumulate in landfills and in nature, creating obstacles for local wildlife when they are dumped in unsanctioned areas. Now, this wouldn’t be a problem if we could just keeps the clothes we buy, but with the emergence of fast fashion trends, humans are buying and disposing of clothes at an alarming rate, increasing the amount being sent to landfills astronomically. If we were doing this with naturals, I don’t think it would be as big of a problem (it still would be a problem, don’t get me wrong), but that makes clothes less accessible and more expensive. There are some companies that have adopted recycling other polymers, like the plastic from water bottles, to create synthetic clothing, but this still poses a problem when the garment is disposed of, as it goes to the exact same place as that plastic bottle would’ve gone. Deadstock could possibly solve this problem. If designers and big brands began using deadstock fabrics and selling whatever scraps they use, there would be much less waste taking up space in landfills. Though, using deadstock is not at all a silver bullet. It still has to be paired with more eco-conscious initiatives on the part of the companies such as making less clothes altogether, and on the part of the consumer such as buying less clothes and reusing your preloved items. I know it sounds sickeningly optimistic, but I think we can genuinely make our home a much better place if we hold ourselves and large corporations more accountable when it comes to our fashion, even though it is largely on the corporations, as most of the time, they are the ones indiscriminantly dumping things around as if they expect some maid to come clean up after them. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed my ramble about fashion this week.
Much love,
Jude ★
