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Understanding the product life cycle | Fast fashion | Sustainable fashion


Going back to a decade, there are only two major seasonal releases of fashion clothing per year in the fashion industry, where each product's production lifecycle is for about 21 months which is nearly two years.


When the fast fashion revolution occurred, the 21 months lifecycle drove down to 4 months, and two seasons pushed up to 52 releases per year. These numbers explain why fashion is the world’s second largest polluter of the environment.


The lifecycle of a typical fashion product moves through different phases like material extraction, transportation, material production, transportation, product production, transportation, consumption, and finally, goes to disposal.


Disposing of products on the environment is massive as they end up in earth's landfills for several years. Also, the below-stated figure shows that a product is transported in each stage of its life lifecycle and also has a negative impact on the environment.

Figure 1.0 Reference: green business bureau



The lifecycle of a sustainable product is partially identical to the typical product, but the sustainable product life cycle attempts to make a difference at the end phase of the product. The sustainable approach aims to reuse and recycle the product at its final stage. This is called a circular economy which focuses on reusing the products instead of tossing them away.


Figure 1.1 Reference: green business bureau


In sustainable brands, the designs are made with fabrics/materials after assessing their impact on the world around them. Recently, sustainable fashion brands started adapting to a framework called cradle-to-cradle design. Cradle to cradle framework helps to create a responsible design where the products have to be either recyclable or biodegradable.


Cradle to cradle (C2C) is a framework committing to a circular economy by reducing the impact of hazardous dyeing chemicals, reducing waste and landfills, efficiently using natural resources and being socially responsible. C2C assesses sustainable fashion brands according to five categories.


They are:


  • Material Health - examining the roots of material and working towards safer material usage

  • Material Reutilization - designing products with environment-friendly materials which reduce waste and landfills.

  • Renewable Energy - seeking to make usage of clean and renewable energy in the production process.

  • Water Stewardship - strives for responsible usage of water

  • Social fairness - creating fair and respectful conditions for all the people and natural systems.

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