Our sustainability workshop had been stagnating for a couple of hours when Nabila, one of the twenty-six Bachelor students on the course, suddenly broke the hesitant, polite tone that had been holding the conversation hostage. We were gathered to brainstorm new pedagogic methods and reflect on ways to educate the next generation of eco-conscious fashion designers. The institution had challenged us with a question: what would a sustainable fashion school look like? But none of the students felt stimulated. Instead, they were incredibly overwhelmed.
Fashion students have grown up with images of John Galliano pouring taffeta over his models like it was whipped cream. Suddenly, fashion had become self-aware, its cultural messages switching 180 with anti-consumerism and thrifting paradoxically becoming shopping trends.
“I agree,” said Vincent. “The reason I’m here is that I love excess, I love glamour, I love extravagance. Now, in order to graduate, I need to incorporate zero-waste pattern cutting and recycled biomaterials!”
The students made a fair point. They had grown up with images of John Galliano pouring taffeta over his models like it was whipped cream. They had been seduced by fashion, lured into the field with promises of endless possibilities and limitless creation. Suddenly, fashion had become self-aware, its cultural messages switching 180 with anti-consumerism and thrifting paradoxically becoming shopping trends. The elite club still existed but it was now morally wrong to join.
Students were learning about the polluting impact of high-speed trend cycles and the exploitative nature of the creative industries, but below all the well-intentioned infographics and crash courses lay a painful realisation, one the students were struggling to come to terms with: the desire that brought you here is harmful. Not exactly the most exciting or creatively enticing idea.
The disappointment continued to spread as we collectively logged on to a virtual panel about fashion education and sustainability. “We need to listen to the next generation,” said the course leader of an Italian fashion school. “The students have the answers,” agreed his German colleague. The tutors on the panel seemed – understandably so – completely at loss on how to solve the climate crisis through fashion and, in an effort to remain positive and inspire the viewers, soothingly claimed that the next generation is infinitely more creative and more conscious. The kids would figure it out.
Not only is it no longer cool to aspire to those things, but students are also expected to create an alternative so desirable and sexy that it will put our consumption-based system to the grave. Not just reject the game, but also invent an entirely new one.
It’s a tempting proposition, born from the same sentiment that made Greta Thunberg the face of climate activism: children are our future and as long as the young are still rising, we can find hope. The problem is that those messages don’t mean anything when you’re a 21-year-old student racking up debt in the hope of building a career that is both creatively fulfilling and financially stable.
This is a generation that was routinely told they could do anything they set their mind to. For many – and especially those from an immigrant or lower-income background, whose parents made significant sacrifices to give their children a chance at higher education – fashion represented hope and opportunity. In exchange for hard work and dedication, you could travel the world, hang with the rich and famous, and maybe even see your family name logo-fied and eternalized in the cosmetics department of international airports.
Not only is it no longer cool to aspire to those things, but students are also expected to create an alternative so desirable and sexy that it will put our consumption-based system to the grave. Not just reject the game, but also invent an entirely new one.
Students receive two messages: you’re a failure if you don’t sell and an immoral ego-maniac if you do.
The desperation in the room was palpable when, during the panel review the next day, another student, Sanaa, exclaimed: “We came here to learn how to make a collection. That in itself is an incredibly difficult task. Find your artistic language, research the concept, develop the technical skills to translate those ideas into garments, source the materials, style the looks, cast the models. Are we seriously expected to add ‘end consumer capitalism’ to our to-do lists?”
Being a true contemporary fashion student means feeling pressure from two sides. Firstly, there is the regular, will-I-ever-be-good-enough, suffocating insecurity that comes with tying your self-worth to your artistic productivity (you know the one). In addition, global warming and social consciousness have contributed an even spicier and more outward-focused existential awareness, the one saying that creation equals pollution. Students receive two messages: you’re a failure if you don’t sell and an immoral ego-maniac if you do.
Students need to be accepted by the status quo and remain critical of it at the same time.
These voices aren’t just internal. In many cases, schools are their echo chambers. Just like fashion labels or media publications, schools need to stay relevant. Or more importantly, they need to appear relevant. Otherwise, students would no longer apply for their courses, and brands would no longer sponsor their events. Educational institutions need to assure their students are internationally recognized for their talents and skills, by being selected for awards like Hyères and LVMH, for example, all while positioning themselves as innovative thought leaders at the forefront of pressing socio-political issues. Therefore, the students need to be accepted by the status quo and remain critical of it at the same time.
You’d start boycotting a sustainability workshop for less. What was meant to be a fun pedagogic exercise around fashion and education suddenly carried the weight of environmental doom.
Does that mean the sustainability debate has no place inside the classroom? Of course not. But it does mean we need to collectively lower our expectations of what can be achieved within this contradictory reality. There needs to be enough room to fully explore the complex emotional experience of trying to “make it” in fashion while trying to “save it”. Right now, students can feel paralised trying to adjust an outdated idea of success to a contemporary value system.
There are ways out of that pressure cooker. In the case of this particular workshop, the students were given enough time to openly admit to their anger, frustration, and sadness, which allowed them to let go of the suffocating emotions and create from a place of pleasure and excitement.
The process was guided through a performance, with the students staging a funeral for the “old fashion system”. As they held pictures of things they would miss – the Olsen twins carrying take-away Starbucks cups and Paris Hilton clasping her monogrammed chihuahua – the students talked honestly and without censure about what it is that brought them to fashion in the first place.
“Dear Old Fashion System. Thank you for showing us that happiness acquired by consumption is superficial. Thank you for showing us that individualism doesn’t have the weight in front of collectivity. You leave us in front of a white page and the duty to fill it with our conscious and not our ego. From now on, with certain anxiety, we are taking our responsibility to create in front of this new field of opportunities,” wrote student Claire.
Sustainability in fashion education tends to focus on the theoretical aspect: the cradle-to-cradle theories and the upcycling sourcing strategies. However, if we want that information to stick, we need to give students time to explore their dreams and desires.
Thus, the students were invited to analyse what it was they wanted from “the old system” – fame, recognition, adventure, money – and say goodbye to the parts that no longer fit the world they wanted to be a part of. Because the process towards sustainability was both active and playful, it didn’t feel like a rushed obligation.
Sustainability in fashion education tends to focus on the theoretical aspect: the cradle-to-cradle theories and the upcycling sourcing strategies. However, if we want that information to stick, we need to give students time to explore their dreams and desires. Take a moment to go through the emotional journey of transforming disappointment into inspiration before quizzing on the textbooks. That is how you reconcile desire and consciousness.
