Vintage Shopping is Sustainable Shopping

By Diana Golde 

www.sustainablestyles.co

Vintage, secondhand and reselling are having a moment. The Covid-19 pandemic and increased environmental concerns have added to the demand and interest in this part of the fashion industry. While fast fashion and big chains used to be the norm, vintage and second-hand shopping, especially those online, are increasingly grabbing our attention. In Irina Grechko’s article in Refinery 29 on how Resale is Thriving in the Pandemic she writes, “While sustainability has been on the minds of many prior to the pandemic, the health emergency has forced many more to rethink their values and commitments. ‘COVID-19 has made a lot of people reconsider their values. Sustainability has never felt like a more urgent issue.’”

Values become essential in talking about sustainability, because sustainability and fashion are not easy to reconcile. The Bruntlandt Report of 1987 defines sustainability in this way: "Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” Consider that definition and the state of our current fashion industry for a minute. It is clear that the way our clothing industry has developed falls far from this definition. In fact the fashion industry we have today, engaged in mass-production, constant change and little thought to the afterlife of products, stands in opposition to a sustainable model. 

Within the vast machinery of unsustainable fashion, vintage and secondhand shopping offers consumers a way to be part of a sustainable solution. An alternative that doesn’t require more production, which regardless of the organic or non-organic quality of fabric is environmentally costly. In The Conscious Closet, Elizabeth L. Cline writes: “The majority of fashion’s environmental impact on the planet happens while manufacturing textiles, in the phase where fabrics and materials are grown or made, then spun, dyed, and finished into something we recognize as clothing”. While local and organic materials and production are better than fast fashion, clothing that does not have to be produced, that are already on the market are inherently as sustainable when getting a second life. 

There is also another major reason that consumers should keep coming back to vintage stores. They have personality. While secondhand stores can attract consumers for the amount they carry, smaller curated vintage stores such as Lórien Vintage become gems through their personal touch and personality. Large brand stores make the consumers feel like a follower of predicted trends and are very impersonal experiences. Individually owned vintage stores with unique selections offer the opposite; an opportunity to find unique one-of-a-kind pieces. When you support a vintage store, you support its owner, the person curating the content of the store. If the selection of items connects to your style and preference it is a place to routinely visit and to invest your time searching through. You won’t just be saving the environment, you might be making a new friend, too. 

For more on sustainability in fashion, visit Diana’s blog at www.sustainablestyles.co