Tangle yoursleves into a new vision

Biomimicry is a term that is being heavily utilized in the eco-world these days. Designing to mimic the environment is an idea that should adpoted by major companies in the apparel indusrty. Working with the environment instead of against it would open up endless opportunities. There are industrial ecology principles that should be utilized if we want to see the idea of biomimicry thrive. The two principles, using materials sparingly and not fouling our nests are the two I will utilize this week to forsee a sustainable future.

Using materials sparingly is exactly as it is stated, use the materials for manufacturing products ONLY if you need them.One big issue with society today is their thinking of more is better. This is not necessarily true. Over consumptions leads to over crowding in landfills. This is a major issue specifically in the apparel industry. An idea that can help to fix this problem would be to more effectively manufacture clothing within the reatil stores. We see a large bulk of merchandise head straight back to the clearance department of stores. Most of the clearance merchandise does not get purchased. So where does this unwanted merchandise go? Mostly into landfills. My idea is to have small and large chain retailers as well as independent retailers have one prototype of the garment in the store. The customer can come into the store and try on the protoypes of each garment that they wish. If they want to purchase the garment or accessory, they can order it and can come pick up their order within the next few days when it is ready. This would fix the issue of over consumption in the store, so merchandise would not be wasted if it was not purchased. Materials would also be used sparingly becuase the designers are not producing in bulk but they are producing for demand. This could also bring about the idea of "localism" that Kate Fletcher brings up in her book, Sustainable Fashion and Textiles. Local designers would have more of an opportunity to show off their skills and big name retailers would not dominate the retail world. It is stated in Fletcher's book, "at the local level it is possible to work closely with users and to develop new or reinstitute old styles as appropriate." Local designers would be able to use local materials and would be able to design for their customer to insure porfit.

The idea of not fouling our nests should also be utilized within the apparel industry. We as humans, should be living in a world that does not slowly kill us. If we "foul our nests" we are comiting suicide slowly but surely. We need to begin living in a society that allows us to thrive instead of deminish our beings. This idea could be used in the apparel industry by only using completely sustainable materials. An idea to work our way to this notion would be to create a lingerie line that is made almost completely from spider silk. Bradley Quinn writes in his book, Textile Futures, that Spider Silk is one of the only material that is completely sustainable and does not harm our environment when producing this fiber. It is strong and sustainable. What more could desginers ask for? Creating a line of lingerie that is completely sustainable would create a buzz in the apparel world becuase of its newness and mystery. This would then in turn result in high demand and sales which would encourage more designers to seek completely sustainable fibers. Though Quinn Bradley's book states that it is hard to reproduce such a fiber as spider silk, I believe that with our curiousty and technology combined, this fiber will be readily available in the near future.

Though these ideas seem far fetched, the future is ever evolving and these ideas can and will help the environmental issues we are facing today.