Now that we know about the long history of fashion exploiting people and the planet – from cotton demand fuelling slavery to polyester driving oil production and pollution – it must become just that: history. Over the past two years, Lee said there has been a huge acceleration in the use of recycled plastics in fashion. "The reason is because the cost of using that has come down to the same price as using virgin polyester. And that's the key — if the price is the same … (it's) a no-brainer. It saves environments (and has) the same commercial costs." Or it might be by joining up with communities that sell, swap, rent, mend or upcycle – like Sustainable Fashion Week. It could also be through making: learn to sew, crochet or knit to see just how much work goes into making one simple garment.

Arguably no consumer goods industry benefits from our throwaway culture more than fast fashion. That’s why buying carefully, and only what we need, can be a powerful act of environmentalism. If you successfully solved the above puzzle and are looking for other related puzzles from the same level then select any of the following:Brands currently "guess" how many pieces of each style they are going to produce, Lee said, and making the clothes takes three to six months before they are sent to stores or put online. What doesn't get sold at full price is marked down. "When it's so cheap, or 70% off, (people think) I don't really need it, but you know what 70% is worth it, (so) I'm going to get that. And then you buy stuff you don't really need," Lee said. The sheer numbers are dizzying. All this oil, just for clothes? All this labour and energy expended – to end up as waste in a pile, to be buried or burned? Like those other women in their uncomfortable dresses, Miss Brill is undone by a moment of shattered self-perception. She briefly conceives of herself as something more – something beautiful and worthy of attention – and is humiliated for daring to believe it. She cannot escape the body beneath the fur, suddenly reminded of her age and taste just as others are unpleasantly reminded by their outfits of their size or class or sense of social inadequacy. Her story is both unremarkable and unbearable. The fantasy is destroyed. The fur is forever tarnished. To calculate the number of clothes thrown away each second, the annual waste figure—around 11.28 million tons, or 22.56 billion pounds—was divided by the number of seconds per year—around 31.56 million. In that calculation, each piece of clothing was estimated to weigh around 5.33 ounces—one third of a pound—to account for differences in types of clothing and footwear.

Almost every piece of clothing we buy is made with some polyester, the data shows. Although the dataset is made up of mostly fast fashion retailers, it’s not just fast fashion that loves polyester. Lululemon joggers? Polyester, nylon and elastane. Gucci skirt? Polyester. While fashion disposal is clearly a huge problem, the human costs start where fast fashion is made.There’s clearly a huge problem here. These plastics not only pollute the environment – they are even getting into our bodies through water and food, with still unknown impacts on health. The EU strategy for sustainable textiles is expected to be published at the end of this month. It is as yet not certain whether it will put an end to this disgraceful trade. FAST FASHION = A DISASTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT The numbers are stark: only 10–30% of clothes you donate to the charity shops will be sold by them and charity shops are so overwhelmed with clothing that’s basically waste. So where does all this clothing go?

Another large clothing market is in Kibera, Kenya. The documentary Textile Mountain. The hidden burden of our fashion waste by Make Europe Sustainable for All tells its story. TONNES OF BRAND NEW CLOTHING DUMPED IN THE CHILEAN DESERT

Other Worlds

The pyramid that I was talking about is a very fragile pyramid: if Forever 21 stops calling the first guy, the rest of it falls apart. These large amounts of plastic are creating significant environmental and social problems, including: Traders and tailors in Accra’s Kantamanto market work hard to repurpose and sell the clothing that arrives on their shores. If you talk about pure polyester, yes, we are close. But the problem is a lot of materials are mixed materials, it's a polyester blend with something else. And separating that has been an issue," Lee explained.

We probably know this. But it’s become too easy to ignore. Dangerous, low-paid work for ‘disposable’ clothes So because of this very interdependent pyramid structure, this house of cards, that you’re talking about, what does reform of this system or radical change look like? Who could lead that? Recycling textiles can be difficult and expensive. Take a look at any clothing label – fibres are often so mixed up, they’ll never be separated and reused in any useful way. And again, with such large volumes, made with massive amounts of cheap materials, wastage in factories is also high. They don’t even want to reveal how many clothes they actually produce each year. 100 billion pieces a year is an estimate from a decade ago, before the explosion in ultra-cheap, disposable fashion from companies like Boohoo and Shein. Buying far less, spending a bit more on better quality garments, and supporting ethical brands are just a few ways to become a sustainability trendsetter.It never occurred to them because it hadn’t happened in a generation, and they’re getting clobbered with the way they set up the supply chain. Countries like Cambodia, Vietnam, and Bangladesh, were so dedicated to making all these clothes to fill that [demand for] volume. It’s a gigantic house of cards, and it’s so delicately balanced. One thing goes and it’s just all collapsing. And it’s collapsing violently. These materials often do not break down or can’t be recycled, which creates a massive plastic waste problem. This doesn’t mean eliminating the use of plastics in clothing entirely — but it does mean using it carefully. We can no longer use plastics to create poorly-made garments which are designed to be worn only a handful of times. Other materials, such as cotton and viscose, can also create environmental problems, so ultimately it is the scale of production that needs to change.” Companies push new trends endlessly and seasons now move faster than ever. Many of these items of clothing are simply made to become waste; to make way for the next brand-new batch of clothing. Did you know that? Not many people do. And that’s likely why it just keeps getting worse: it’s thought that if nothing changes, by 2050 fashion will take up a quarter of the world’s carbon budget.