There is a lot of attention for the circular economy at the moment. I recently read the report from WRAP. This report asks the question whether there is a business case for circular business models in the clothing sector. Let me share with you the findings.

Traditional business models are vulnerable to rising input costs and particularly raw material costs. (p. 9) Consumer goods businesses have developed business models that are predicated on cheap raw materials and labour costs. Fashion businesses have globalized sourcing raw materials and labour from low-cost countries in order to make a profit. (p.10) Now new roads need to be explored in order to have a feasible and profitable business in the future.

When produced in low cost labour countries, the true costs of production have not been completely factored in. (p.11) In the report they mean costs like water use, which are rarely monitored in these countries, but I think they should also mean the low salary and poor conditions the factory workers are working in. These workers pay with their lives for your garment.

The business models that are explored in this report are models that extend the life of clothes and increase the proportion of garments that are re-used instead of being discarded prematurely. (p.3) These models are examined on commercial viability and scalability.

The following models are explored:

We need to accept the fact that ageing is a process that belongs to the world. Products that evolve together with people get older too. They change, get some scars and a user can be emotionally attached to it, because they went through a lot of things together.

To accept the process of ageing you also need to address the issue of perfection. We live in a world where everything needs to be perfect. If it isn’t perfect you throw it away…but why not repair it? Use it again? Don’t design for perfection, because perfection is vulnerable. One scratch makes it imperfect.

When planning a products lifespan, consider the lifespan of the materials from which the product is made. Make recyclable products in such a way the quality of the material does not degrade when being recycled. And make disposable things that will last only as long as we need them. Food packaging for example now lasts much longer than the item that is packed.

My research (2009) shows that a lot of companies and designers that are working for a longer time in fashion said ‘no’ to the idea of incorporating eco-effective designing in their design process. One of the reasons they gave is being busy with following a fashion schedule; they have to show a collection every half a year (or even more). The designers do not have time to slow down and reinvent or even reflect on what they are doing. They have to continue the same way to make money. (Other reasons were: a lack of choices in materials, the materials are more expensive, do not know where to start)

In this case it is important to stop and think for a moment about what your purpose is of working this way. What is the greater goal? Think less competitive but more cooperative. What do people need? What do people want? From my point of view I would say: we need protection from the elements of nature, so we need clothes. We want our clothes to show our identity, so we want to change the way we look. This makes fashion a need. But do we have to own the garments? Do we have to use different materials all the time? Or can we reuse our materials?

Service is an important part in environmental friendly designing; the life of a garment actually begins after selling. The company needs to keep in contact with the user and needs to guide the user and its object through life. Thereby the company can literally see the effects his garment has on the environment.
‘User experience could be defined as the perception resulting from the experiences a person has with a company, its products and its services at every point where that company touches their lives.’ [1]

User experience, as well as fashion itself, is a way of life. With this experience it is important that the experience is real. Users have expectations, especially with all the advertisements that say you need to buy something to become happy. The product needs to do what is expected, but it is the way the individual uses the product that brings about the real experience. ‘As consumers we do not seek the product (for example towels), but the functionality that it offers us (dry hands).’ [2]

The designer translates the needs of a user to a product or service that fits with the current place, time and social/cultural surroundings of that user. During this process a lot of different aspects are important and it is up to the designer to make the right choices with the knowledge he has at that moment.

In the current system it is all about costs, esthetics and performance, there is no eye for the total picture. “Because the economy put no price tag on resource drawdown’s or on pollution, it gave no incentive to extract sustainably, process cleanly or optimize use.”[1] “What if industries were forced to cover the full environmental costs of their activities up front instead of leaving the bill for the public to pay? It would be expensive, and in this new schema of pricing green manufacturing would actually be cheaper.”[2]

Luckily, Fourteen years after Janine Benyus wrote her book “Biomimicry”, Puma changed this issue and did put a price tag on the environment.

Puma’s environmental profit and loss account

As you have read in my post of February 10th Professor Manfred-Maxneef described the human needs. The needs for Subsistence, Protection, Affection, Understanding, Participation, Creation and Leisure have existed since the origins of homo habils and, undoubtedly since the appearance of homo sapiens. Probably the need for Identity and the need for Freedom appeared later. It is likely that in the future the need for Transcendence will become as universal as the other needs.[1]

For ages fashion and clothing are a way of satisfying certain needs.

• Subsistence & Protection; Clothing protects our body from nature; warmth, sun, cold, water etc.
• Participation & Identity: Communication through fashion, which expresses time, place and emotional state of mind.
• Leisure, Creation, Freedom & Affection: Fashion as an art form; searching for a real experience of beauty with all our senses; seeing, feeling, tasting, hearing and smelling.

Besides these needs there are developments that make it possible for us to satisfy our needs in a quicker way.