Earth Day 2021: bringing back environmental harmony

Image: Lukasz Szmigiel

The very first Earth Day to support environmental protection was in 1970. Earth Day is an annual event on April 22nd that has gained tremendous momentum globally since its inception. So, let’s look at a few environmental facts about the current state of the earth in 2021:

Paris Agreement - with the promises made by countries under the agreement, it sets us on a trajectory of about 3 degrees Celsius by the end of the century, where 30 – 50% of existing species could go extinct by the end of the century.

Food agriculture - average yields of food crops are likely to reduce by 30%, triggering famines in several parts of the world which will cause political and social disasters.

Displacement from climate change - according to Nature, about 1.5 billion people (climate refugees) will be displaced as some regions will become uninhabitable.

Deforestation – 50% of the earth’s tropical forest have been cleared off in the last 50 years.

Soil depletion – Industrial monoculture has destroyed 40% of global topsoil used for food agriculture faster than it can be replenished. We have 60 years of harvest left with our topsoils at the current trajectory according to UN scientists.

Biodiversity loss – between 1970 and 2016, we’ve destroyed 83% of wild mammals and 50% of all plants with an average 68% decrease in population sizes of mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and fish. The extinction rate is up to 1000 times faster than prior to the industrial revolution.

Emissions causing climate breakdown – the global North (richer countries) is responsible for 92% of emissions that cause climate breakdown, while the global South (poorer countries) is responsible for 8%.

Capitalism – it’s the reason for these high emissions. As the only economic system that demands constant material growth, it means endlessly plundering the earth for raw materials. It peddles the myth that we need to keep consuming a lot of fossil fuels & raw materials in order to thrive. But this lie is killing the planet and will destroy us too.

I’m inspired by the resolve shown by many people this Earth Day to protect the earth. It’s noble to see many people joining the sustainability movement and changing their lifestyles. However, based on the current global economic trajectory, consumer action alone is not enough to avoid total ecological breakdown. We need to change our systems. And implement a law of balance in all areas to bring harmony back to the earth's ecosystems and with people. The narrow focus of material growth and accumulation as the pinnacle for human life on earth needs to change. Material things are tools to support life on earth, not the purpose of life itself.

♥ Nina Gbor

Instagram: @eco.styles

Curbing biodiversity loss in fashion's supply chain

Image: Chris Charles

‘Transforming the Fashion Sector to Drive Positive Outcomes to Drive Biodiversity, Climate and Oceans’ is a new initiative with $4 million in funding to cut biodiversity loss in the fashion supply chain. Biodiversity loss and climate change are two out of nine planetary boundaries. In a previous article, I wrote about how fashion impacts climate change and suggestions for collectively setting a net-zero trajectory. Fashion’s impact on biodiversity loss, however, has gotten less coverage than climate change.

The current state of biodiversity loss

Biodiversity loss according to Britannica is “a decrease in biodiversity within a species, an ecosystem, a given geographic area, or Earth as a whole.” Global biodiversity loss has recently been calculated to be 100 to 1000 times higher than how it should occur naturally (or by the pre-industrial revolution). And this extinction rate is accelerating. We’ve destroyed 83% of wild mammals and 50% of all plants with an average 68% decrease in population sizes of mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and fish between 1970 and 2016. With about 200 to 2,000 extinctions estimated to be occurring each year, that comes to roughly 2 million extinctions. We are destroying the Earth’s biocapacity by at least 56% to fuel our 21st-century lifestyles driven by capitalism, overconsumption, over-exploitation of natural resources, climate change, pollution and land-use change. 30 - 50 % of existing species are projected to be extinct by the end of the century.

The threat to humanity

As the planet is facing its sixth mass extinction, biodiversity loss is one of the greatest risks facing humanity on earth. It’s impacting all life on the planet presently and will do so for millions of years into the future. In the pursuit of economic growth, colossal amounts of aquatic, terrestrial and marine ecosystems have been annihilated. Capitalist activities have wrecked the biodiversity that all life in water, in air and on land depend upon. In this sense, we’re being our own worst enemy.

Image: Europeana

Amongst other factors, biodiversity loss threatens food security. The services rendered to humanity by the ecosystems are undeniably valuable to the existence and wellbeing of human beings. Services such as water purification, carbon sequestration, crop pollination and flood protection. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has calculated the worth of the services provided by ecosystems in the world at $125-140 trillion (US dollars) per year. That’s more than one and a half times the size of global GDP! Immediate action is necessary to address the loss of the biodiversity that feeds the world and maintains the balance and harmony of life on the planet.  

Fashion is taking action

We’re well aware that fashion is one of the biggest culprits amongst industries that contribute to environmental damage and biodiversity loss. As the demand for clothing gets bigger, the impact on the earth’s raw materials and therefore biodiversity loss will also increase. On the current trajectory, the fashion industry is expected to use 35% more land for the production of fibre by the year 2030. This is an extra 115 million hectares that can be left alone to preserve biodiversity. The good news is that fashion is starting to address its role in biodiversity loss within its supply chains.

The Fashion Pact is an international coalition whose signatories represent about a third of the fashion industry by volume with 60 signatories representing over 200 brands. In 2020 The Pact committed to biodiversity restoration and protection. The plan is for the ‘Transforming the Fashion Sector to Drive Positive Outcomes to Drive Biodiversity, Climate and Oceans’ initiative to develop and provide guidance to The Pact on best practice for reducing deforestation, clean supply chain and better agricultural practices. The hope is that fashion will eventually curb biodiversity loss through regenerative approaches to agricultural supply chains and by reducing carbon emissions while improving the lives of producers.

The endless pursuit of material growth for overconsumption means constantly plundering the earth for raw materials to manufacture products to sell for financial gain. It has turned the worst parts of humanity into agents of destruction, threatening to eliminate the firm support given to us by the earth for our continual existence. Instead, we can allow nature and the ecosystems to remain natural and thereby flourish. The result? We will reap a joyful upbuilding of the planet that’s far healthier, balanced, harmonious and equitable for all species including humans.

♥ Nina Gbor

Instagram: @eco.styles

Vintage: a portal to fashion’s sustainable future

Over the years, I’ve become somewhat of an op shop (thrift store) aficionado with a deep love for vintage (clothing circa 1940s – 1960s) treasures like this grand pink ball gown. I started op shopping at age 15. The love for vintage happened in my childhood from watching style icons of the vintage era in classic films.

About 90% of my wardrobe is either vintage or preloved (secondhand). When I first started this journey, it wasn’t really cool to wear secondhand. People just thought you were either a hippy, poor or just freakin’ weird! It thrills me to know that vintage clothing is increasingly becoming more popular and it has had 46% growth in sales compared to 2017.

A league of its own

Each country in the global North has their figures but in Australia alone, over 501 million kg of unwanted clothes go into landfill each year! Another 94 million kg gets exported overseas but some of that also ends up in landfill, albeit on another continent. Why am I bringing this up? Because these figures include vintage clothes! I haven’t figured out the precise amount but it irks me nonetheless to even think of vintage being wasted like this. Vintage clothing is in a league of its own. Here’s why: vintage usually lasts at least 4 or 5 decades longer than most contemporary clothes. Secondly, if your wardrobe is blessed enough to be graced with quality vintage pieces, you possess a little piece of history that might hold clues for a sustainable fashion future. And finally, incorporating vintage pieces into your wardrobe is like style on steroids! Exhibit A: my pink ball gown. No, it’s not a costume even though I look like I’m on set of an 1800s period drama!  

Everyone can wear vintage

Vintage fashion is certainly not limited to ball gowns like mine and the ones you see on screen sirens like Elizabeth Taylor or Grace Kelly. You can find daily vintage-wear ties, scarves, shirts, dresses, pants, skirts, brooches, hats, etc. Each item brings its own special kind of magic. Some pieces give you all the ‘feels’ of the era they were made. Even though vintage can range from thousands of dollars in cost for luxury designer items, all the way down to merely just a few dollars in cost, the value of a vintage piece is not in the price. It’s in the magic of that piece. For instance, the way it can set your wardrobe ablaze with stylish inimitability and the power it has to turbocharge your serotonin levels when you get dressed.

Mainstreaming vintage

If you’ve been following me for any length of time, you’ll know that I abhor trends. Trends are short term and therefore fuel textile waste. And the implication with trends is that people are to wait for a celebrity or advert to dictate or bestow permission to wear something, whether or not that thing is right for you. That choice belongs solely to you and your intuition. So, instead of making vintage-wearing another trend, let’s make it part of our daily culture by giving ourselves the permission to wear it throughout life. Take back your personal power (if you haven’t already) and normalise the habit of incorporating vintage pieces into your wardrobe. The greater goal here is to for it to become an everyday thing for as long as humans are wearing clothes.

How to wear vintage

I’ve been pondering upon what it’ll take for vintage to become as ubiquitous as fast fashion with all age groups. Start with baby steps by incorporating one item at a time to mix with your more contemporary pieces. My ensemble below is an example. This white denim jacket, tan cross body bag and sneakers transform this dress from ball gown to more casual everyday wear. I literally wear this look to lunch, dinner or to hang out with friends. The next time you need something in your closet, try searching through online vintage stores, your local vintage shops, op shops or even save the dates of the next vintage markets in your area.

When we all rise to the challenge of #DailyVintageWearing, we’ll be heroes for preserving these treasures that hold the exquisite craftsmanship of artisans from past generations for the future generations to experience. And on some level, we’ll buffer the environmental burden created by clothing manufacture and textile landfill waste.

STYLING

Outfit sourced from:

Rose pink vintage ball gown: Op shop

Tan Belt: Noffs Op Shop

White denim jacket and tan cross body bag: Hand-me-downs

♥ Nina Gbor

Instagram: @eco.styles

Images by Najah Onn

A different kind of Christmas

I chuckled when I found this Grinch t-shirt at a clothes swap a couple of years ago. 'How the Grinch Stole Christmas' is a culturally iconic story and popular children’s book I read as a kid. In the 2000 film adaptation with Jim Carrey, the Grinch’s home was bombarded with trash from the townspeople’s Christmas celebrations. For this and other reasons, the Grinch hated Christmas. So, he tried to stop the holiday by stealing people’s Christmas presents from their homes while they slept.  

I've never been a fan of the superfluous nature of the festive holiday period with its excessive overconsumption rituals that seem to get worse every year. Christmas has been reduced to the notion of excessive material consumption, excessive food waste, excessive packaging, decorations and presents that people don't need or probably don't even want. Most of it ends up in landfill. Australians for instance wasted an estimated $400 million on unwanted presents last Christmas! Some environmentalists even say that Christmas is the world’s greatest annual environmental disaster. Americans throw away 25% more trash during the holiday season, amounting to 25 million tons of garbage which is about 1 million extra tons per week based on data from Stanford University. And according to the OECD, about 54 million plates of food are thrown out in the UK every Christmas. Food waste and its supply chain is a major source of CO2 emissions. The IPCC report on Climate Change and Land stated that wasted and lost food is responsible for up to 10% of all global greenhouse gas emissions. This might be why my Grinch t-shirt resonates. The Grinch is in this way symbolic of disrupting the holiday overconsumption culture.   

It feels like the beautiful things about the holidays like family, culture, connection, community and the opportunity for rest and reflection have been corrupted. Now it’s all about consumerism and directing our efforts towards skyrocketing profits for big corporations. So, what if we redirected all of these resources towards making life liveable for people who are underprivileged or marginalised? What if, instead of going along with the old tradition of giving presents to someone who doesn't really need it, maybe the cost or the item/service can be donated to the people or organisations that work towards environmental regeneration?

I think the moral of the Grinch story was that after lamenting on the stolen presents, the townspeople realised they could have a happy Christmas without the excessive material stuff. We too can create a different kind of Christmas. During the super consumption period that goes from Black Friday through to the holidays and into the January sales, we buy and consume a lot of stuff in richer countries. It’s a good opportunity for low-income earners to afford necessary items and luxurious treats. It’s also a time to shift this modern trend of THE NEED TO BUY things we don’t need. We spend a big portion of our lives shopping and spending. This isn’t necessarily about being frugal. This is about filling our lives with purposeful activities that have a more lasting impact on our souls than just inanimate objects we pay for.

The holidays carry a different meaning for everyone, but I hope the end of this year is a time of positive introspection for all of us. A time we use wisely to do some self-love and self-care by alchemising the things within us that keep us from evolving to our highest selves. And shifting habits like unnecessary consumption that damage ecosystems and hurt the environment. And by doing random things like showing bundles of love and acts of kindness to the people that would never expect it from us both online and in-person.

The holidays done differently

If we choose to resist the status quo and #MakeChristmasGreatAgain, here are a few tips:

Personalise the holidays. It’s important to recognise that we don’t have to stick to doing the same thing we’ve been doing for decades or centuries. We can make brand new holiday traditions that hold personal meaning for you, family and friends. Ones that don’t have to rely on excessive use of things or products to make the holidays fun.

Giving – Have you noticed that people who have a lot, get given a lot too? Consider giving to people who really, actually need resources and things for their survival and personal growth. This is one way to tip the scales towards more balance and equality in society. Seek out people in need within your local community or even in parts of the global South to give to. Giving need not be something limited to the holidays. It can be all year round.

Quit holiday sales – Reducing overconsumption is about finding alternative habits to replace excessive shopping. Buy what you need, reuse, recycle and repair when you can. Place a higher value on experiences over things.

Photos by Madé Kosala

♥ Nina Gbor

Instagram: @eco.styles

The perks of secondhand fashion (from a lifelong fashionista)

I’ve been wearing secondhand clothes since before I can remember. First, it was through hand-me-downs from my brothers during my childhood tomboy days. Later in my teenage years, it evolved to crafting my own personal style using the super eclectic range of clothes in thrift stores. It was a rare and unique opportunity to find my passion at an early age, playing dress-up by mixing vintage and trendy pieces. I loved secondhand shopping and styling so much that I built a career on it!

Even with all the style and excitement, I got from secondhand shopping, it took years for me to publicly come out as a secondhand fashionista. It was social taboo because of the stigma attached to it like the perception of dirty, mouldy clothing and the idea that it was only for poor people. Fortunately, this stigma has shifted, and secondhand fashion is becoming popular and even more fabulous.

One of the most surprising things I discovered about secondhand fashion is that it teaches you to figure out who you are and helps you appreciate yourself. As opposed to following fashion trends, selecting pieces to form a cohesive wardrobe from a plethora of clothes from multiple fashion eras and diverse cultures naturally makes you dig a little deeper beyond the surface to figure out who you are and what you want to express in your style. Eventually, I discovered a few more perks to this wonderful world of secondhand.

1. Social sustainability – Majority of the people who make our clothes are women in poorer countries, mostly in Asia and Africa. They are exploited because they are not paid fair, liveable wages where they can afford the basic life essentials such as healthcare, education and adequate food for themselves and their families. This happens despite working 12 – 16 hours a day. Buying secondhand sends a message to brands that we will stop buying their clothes when they are exploiting garment workers. It’s important that we inform these brands and urge them to pay liveable wages so that the workers do not end up unemployed.

2. Environmental sustainability – Fashion is one of the most polluting industries in the world. About 80 - 150 billion new garments are produced worldwide each year, more than double what was made in the year 2000. Of the garments made each year, 85% ends up in landfill or incinerated. Most of this pollution happens during manufacture and disposal.  Secondhand shopping reduces reliance on raw materials, chemical procedures and fashion waste to landfill which all contribute to environmental damage. A circular economy with secondhand is a much better way to go.

3. It’s more affordable – Secondhand is such a great option for your savings and when you’re on a budget. However, considering the vast amount of environmental damage that fashion is responsible for, it’s essential to bear this in mind so that we prevent overconsumption of secondhand fashion. In a previous article, I explained in more detail why secondhand fashion is not about being cheap.  

4. Self-empowerment - I alluded to this earlier when I talked about knowing and expressing yourself in your style. Secondhand can be a relatively quicker and easier way to glide on the path of inner growth and self-discovery. If you choose not to follow fashion trends that have been dictated, you’ll realise your personality, goals, character or lifestyle will be the tools you use when you’re choosing your pieces. It can strengthen your self-image and instil a stronger sense of confidence.    

5. Unique personal style - Needless to say, shopping secondhand means your style is likely to be authentic and different from the usual. If you value individuality when it comes to your wardrobe and outside the box fashion styles then secondhand is your new (or existing) best friend.

This month, Oxfam UK is running a SecondHand September campaign where they’re inspiring people to say no to new clothes for 30 days #SecondHandSeptember. In the UK, 13 million items of clothing end up in landfill every week. In Australia, 6,000 kilos of textile waste ends up in landfill every ten minutes. Oxfam’s challenge is a fun opportunity to help reduce fashion waste by fully immersing yourself in secondhand fashion if you haven’t done so already. To find sources for secondhand clothing that are local to you, you can search online for clothes swaps, thrift stores, markets and wardrobe rental/hire platforms. Here are a few online platforms: Yordrobe, Ekoluv, Depop, Etsy, Carousell, Poshmark, Marketplace and Beyond Retro.

STYLING

With this ensemble, I went for a mixed pattern, monochrome look using a staple tan waist belt to break the monotone pattern. Finished the look with leopard-print stilettos. I added the vintage, red clutch bag for a bright colour pop. The standout features of the outfit are the ruched sleeves on the polka dot top and the monochrome chessboard pattern on the skirt because it demands your attention. When you’re styling yourself, choose pieces and combinations that make sense to you and make you feel good.

Outfit sourced from:

Polka Dot Top - Savers Australia Op Shop

Monochrome Chessboard Skirt – Marketplace

Tan Belt – Noffs Op Shop

Red Vintage Purse - Marketplace

Leopard-print Stilettos – A wardrobe staple 

♥ Nina Gbor

Instagram: @eco.styles