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    The Vintage Mindset
    The Vintage Mindset
    The Vintage Mindset
    Ebook138 pages1 hour

    The Vintage Mindset

    By Jillian McCarthy

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Did you know the fashion industry is the world's second most polluting industry just behind the oil and gas sector?


    Most consumers go into a store and pick up a new pair of jeans; not thinking of the huge impact that goes into its production. The fab

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherNew Degree Press
    Release dateDec 12, 2020
    ISBN9781636761725
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      Book preview

      The Vintage Mindset - Jillian McCarthy

      The Vintage Mindset

      The Vintage Mindset

      Jillian McCarthy

      New Degree Press

      Copyright © 2020 Jillian McCarthy

      All rights reserved.

      The Vintage Mindset

      ISBN

      978-1-63676-571-6 Paperback

      978-1-63676-170-1 Kindle Ebook

      978-1-63676-172-5 Ebook

      Contents

      Preface

      The New Fashion Landscape

      Renewing the American Dream

      All in an Internship

      The Rental Model

      The Consignment Model

      Fashion Should Never Go to Waste

      The Vintage Mindset

      Sempre Amici

      The Age of the Amateur

      Indigo Extractions

      Keep Your Cadence

      If You Can Wear It, I Can Embroider It

      Conclusion

      Appendix

      Acknowledgments

      This book is dedicated to my many wonderful teachers at Medford High School, in particular, Mr. Ambrose, Mr. Milne, and Ms. Daneau. Thank you for inspiring me each and every day.

      Don’t buy much, but make sure that what you buy is good.

      - Christian Dior

      Preface

      The history of fashion thus far can be characterized by materialism, over-consumption, and irresponsible business practices. However, the devastating results of the global health pandemic caused by COVID-19 have put the effects of such practices and the outrageous consumer demand for instant gratification into the spotlight. In the near future, brands will face polarizing views regarding the state of fashion and the future of an entire industry based on consumer demand for discounted, low priced, and frequently updated items. I predict that consumer values will soon shift to place a pressing importance on sustainability, which will give brands a critical opportunity to reinvent themselves within the new, emerging landscape.

      The fashion industry—particularly that of fast fashion¹—is highly pollutive of the environment and uses many questionable sourcing and production methods to meet consumers’ demands and keep costs low. The industry’s increasingly environmentally destructive and morally unethical processes are not solely the fault of consumer demand—many people are unaware since this information is not readily available for a consumer. To make matters more complicated, most consumers are not fashion experts; even if they seek out information, they will likely not be able to understand the effects of textile costs on pricing or be attuned to the differences in processes behind artisan leather produced at a small farm in Tuscany for a luxury label versus faux leather containing toxic chemicals produced in India for a fast fashion retailer whose name they recognize. As the fast fashion model increased in popularity, so did the number of brands and businesses that replicated or mimicked luxury goods at affordable prices and much lower quality than real thing.

      The necessary changes to the fashion industry will not happen overnight, but we have reached a point where we can now fathom how unnecessary our fashion consumption is. We have reached a tipping point and we are all aware the industry we love that fosters our imagination and drives our creativity cannot go back to the way it was before the pandemic.

      As the world hesitantly enters 2021, we see political uncertainty, dangerous climate change, and a rapidly evolving digital landscape, to everyone’s great dismay. Due to these changes, people have developed a newfound sense of urgency to diminish their carbon footprint; this growing emphasis on sustainability has created a market crowded with eco-friendly brands that are actually ‘greenwashing’—or falsely advertising—how the companies actually produce their products and relay information about their brand as a whole.

      Through all of the uncertainty behind a sustainable ethos such as regard for factory garment workers, environmental impact, and natural textiles and fibers, there are some key players who are actually changing the landscape as fashion as we know it. Independent innovators, dreamers, and promoters of the future of fashion follow closely behind these key players.

      Sustainable brands like Patagonia, Stella McCartney, Eileen Fisher, Mara Hoffman, and other smaller labels are the current talk of the fashion industry; however, these brands are unable to effectively reach the masses for a number of reasons, such as price point, brand positioning, and physical retail location to customer segmentation and targeting. If there are not enough brands that can effectively appeal to and convince the everyday consumer to purchase their sustainable products, how else can the industry and our planet as a whole have a future? The answer lies in the past.

      Think about the gorgeous pair of creamy white trousers from the ‘90s hanging in your closet. Or the raggedy but beloved ‘80s Queen band tee folded in your drawer. What do these two items have in common? Not only were they both dug out of a vintage store somewhere, but they also brought a thrill to the retail experience when you the discovered something unexpected from the past. Fashion consumers love the idea of going into a store to find something they do not need but rather something that excites and satisfies their need to consume.

      The retail landscape has shifted dramatically with the rise of technology in the digital age. People can order groceries to their door on their lunch break with their smartphone. Retailers have shuttered their doors and revamped their online presence. Institutions such as Barneys New York and various concept stores from Colette to Opening Ceremony have been acquired and shut down. Specialty stores across the country such as Louis of Boston have disappeared. The thrill of retail no longer rests in the suburban shopping mall; consumers order via Amazon Prime and find products they once saw in stores marked down by 30 percent online.

      Despite the shift to online shopping over the past several years, there are still two places consumers can visit to seek a new and interesting experience: vintage stores and off-price retailers. Both of these types of stores provide the opportunity for customers to find something new and unexpected, whether they really need it or not. The idea of walking into a store and having no idea what you might find is distinctly rare in a society that quite literally runs on services that bring us exactly what we want, when we want it.

      The idea of buying vintage pieces has two distinct effects on consumers. Some consumers—specifically the younger generational cohorts of Millennial and Gen Z-ers—thoroughly enjoy shopping vintage to enjoy a nostalgic past that is essentially inaccessible today. In contrast, another group of consumers refuses to shop vintage because they view the second-hand market as unsophisticated and outdated. This viewpoint is concerning when you consider the tremendous benefit that shopping vintage has on the fashion industry; it is the most sustainable version of consumption. In this context, the term, ‘sustainable,’ means that buying used clothing is a way of extending the life of a retail item, whether it be a pair of beloved leather Gucci loafers or a retro 1980s ski jacket. Shopping vintage prolongs the time consumers use a garment, therefore testing its quality and flaunting its age rather than keeping it for a season and tossing it out as it goes out of style.

      The prolonging and increased utility of a garment has inspired Marist College senior and fashion design student, Isabel Holden, to design her final capsule collection around sustainability and natural dying techniques. Holden is somewhat of a trailblazer in the Gen Z design community, recently winning the prestigious undergraduate Council of Fashion Designers of America’s (CFDA) Liz Claiborne Design Scholarship Award in 2019. Holden won the award for her commitment to cross-discipline and environmentally conscious design work, which she displayed in her senior design collection presented at Marist’s Silver Needle Runway show in May 2020.

      What is perhaps the greatest takeaway from Holden’s successes is her motivation to fix the wasteful consumption habits of fashion, which she spearheads in a collaborative manner. Dame Ellen MacArthur, founder of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation that focuses on bringing the idea of a circular economy to scale, names collaborating as one of her four major points to successfully implement the concept of circularity. In fact, industry professionals, designers, and innovators alone cannot carry out every single idea for reinventing, restructuring, and restoring the fashion industry; the new age of the fashion industry must be a collaborative vision with consumers as well.

      Despite the growing awareness around fast fashion and its implications—the mass production of low-quality, inexpensive goods copied and replicated directly from the latest runway trends—there are still milestones to reach to help eradicate the extensive human and environmental costs that have been completely exposed due to the global pandemic. The alternative we must consciously choose now is the idea of ‘slow fashion,’ which involves ethical labor standards, sustainable sourcing methods, and the production of high-quality garments made to last. As fashion students, industry professionals, and young creatives, we must make the choice to not only make the world a more beautiful place but also to make it a healthier one.

      ‘Green’ fashion has failed the industry considerably due to lack of funding, innovation, poor reporting, and an overall consensus to prioritize profit over environmental standards. Consumers are confused, and moreover, skeptical of the ‘sustainable’ practices that companies claim to use. This skeptical mindset

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