What is Slow Fashion? Easy & Affordable Ways to Try It

by Carley Lake | Last Updated:   May 29, 2020

First, what is slow living?

According to The Slow Living Company, the slow living movement is a lifestyle emphasizing slower approaches to everyday life which can include fashion (we will get to what is slow fashion soon!). It’s the idea of actively slowing down enough to enjoy the present and your life—from how you eat your meals, to the way you are with your partner, to how you spend your free time.  (That sounds nice.)

The slow living movement encourages you to consciously and physically slow down. The quarantine is a great excuse to test out this way of being— do less, judge yourself less, be present, disconnect, find pleasure in little things, do one task at a time, and breathe. (I’m already calmer just by reading that.) 

Benefits of slow living:

• Improving your relationships. The more you are fully present with people the more you can have meaningful conversations and moments together.

• Lessening stress. Rushing around and trying to a lot at once usually leads to more stress. Slowing down can help calm yourself too.

• Reducing our impact on the environment. When we slow down we use fewer resources which means we produce less waste leading to less pollution.

• Enjoying life. When we move so fast, maybe we are missing and not paying attention to the little details, our values, and the purpose behind why we do things and how we spend our time. 

I’m excited to live more of a slow life—especially when it comes to fashion and consuming. 

According to Who What Wear, slow fashion is all about integrity. It’s about choosing to consume fashion consciously, It’s also the deliberate choice to buy better quality items,  less often, and caring for our clothes over overconsuming and then wasting. I started this site to embrace this type of fashion…but it’s time to double down.

How to bring the slow life to your fashion:

Read the go-to slow fashion books

I love spending a morning looking at my clothes and asking if they spark joy. I did read The Art of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo and did the KonMari method. But there are other great reads that can give you more steps to create a conscious, curated wardrobe with clothes you actually wear and love. You’ll also learn you can buy less while discovering your true style. And the planet and your wallet will thank you. Check out my list of the best capsule wardrobe and slow fashion how-to books.

Mend and sew to make slow fashion

Now is the perfect time to learn how to love the clothes you already own and give them some love through mending and sewing to embrace slow fashion. Fix a button of a jacket that has been sitting in your closet, unworn for the past year. Cover a hole in your sweater with a cool cross-stitch. Take an old pair of jeans to sew on different fabric patches. See my list of the best sewing, embroidery, and mending classes.

You can also learn a few mending techniques in my interview and mending guide with Lucie Chaptal of @wemadetogether, who uses her skills, time, and love for mending clothes to help others take care of their items and rethink the value of their clothing. 

For more slow fashion meding techniques, I recommend checking out Katrina Rodabuagh, author of “Mending Matters”, Jessica Marquez, author of “Make and Mend”, and Meg McElwee who is donating 25% of enrollment fees for her The Mindful Wardrobe Project sewing course, to Partners in Health, a global health organization restoring social justice by bringing quality health care to the most vulnerable around the world.

Try out different slow fashion outfits

I’m all about wearing the same outfit over and over again. Not buying is slow fashion! But if you already have the items (and maybe your partner’s items too…) take the time to pair items together to create outfits you haven’t tried. it may also cheer you up to put some actual pants on. Take polaroids of the outfits you create and once the virus passes you can bring out that dress you haven’t worn since college graduation now that you realized it looks good with your boyfriend’s old sweater you *mended!* with your 8th grade vegan Dr. Martens combat boots. 

Start a buy no new clothing slow fashion challenge 

It’s also a great time to try a challenge to not buy any new clothes. With the above 2 projects, you should be able to have 2x the amount of outfits you can wear post-quarantine. Start your no new buying challenge and see how long you can go.

Swap now or later

Now that you have optimized your items and discovered new outfits you may have also realized some items don’t bring you the joy they once did or you may think one of your friends would love something you found in your closet. Make a pile of clothing items to swap with friends. Once you can hang out again have a clothing swap.

Or!!…You can even send a fun care package to a friend with the item and a note to give them some quarantine joy. They can wear it around the house and then send it off to another friend and keep the love chain going—Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants style.

Discover and support small sustainable slow fashion businesses

Yes, this may be confusing with me suggesting a project of not buying new. Consuming less is okay too, especially if it is a gift for a friend or when you are supporting a zero-waste designer or secondhand seller. See my top 30+ recycled and upcycled brands list. Have a best friend’s B-Day in September? Why not buy now or get a gift card. But don’t just buy to buy. Some brands and platforms I love:

• The perfect quarantine sweats: Zero Waste Daniel creates one-of-a-kind joggers made from uses pre-consumer waste sourced from New York City’s garment industry. I really don’t consider his items “new” when doing a no new challenge. 🙂

• Secondhand finds: Support your local secondhand shop online and sellers via your favorite apps like Poshmark and Vinted. See my favorite apps, sites, and stores.

• Gifts for all your friends, parents, co-workers: On Made Trade you can find ethically-sourced goods from artisans and makers around the world. I ordered my dad an ethically-made pocket square on the site.

• Start the slow living young: Full disclosure my friend and former coworker Kaajal started this company but I am obsessed even if I didn’t know her…Her company Boundless Blooms created a Mindful Moments interactive book and flashcard set to help children discover new ways to breathe, move, and use their senses.

Other ways to start living the slow life: 

• Read for the fun of reading (And not just to check it off your to-do). I’ll be exploring climate change reads, learning about cooperatives, and reading collections of essays by comedy writers like Phoebe Robinson and Ali Wong. I’ll continue to add to my Good Reads as I complete and review if you want to follow along.

• Video chat with your grandparents (and parents): Maybe play some trivia together, chat through favorite vacation memories, and make sure they have the supplies and groceries they need. Delivery companies are still running and you can help get items delivered to their door so they don’t head out.  

• Write 30 minutes a day (don’t judge what comes out on the page!). I love Think Written’s 365 creative writing prompts. 

• Enjoy seeing yourself get stronger or more flexible. I’ll be trying some new stretches to try to get into the splits. Giving myself the challenge to learn to do the splits is motivating me to stretch and make it part of my daily routine. 

• Write notes to your friends on why you are thankful for them. This can be part of your daily writing exercise. Send a snail mail to your BFFs on why you love them. I’m sure it will make a lonely day inside a bit brighter when they get the mail at their door. Include the clothing item you want to share with them too (see above)!

• Try learning another skill “you never have time for because it doesn’t benefit my Linkedin profile..”. Voice lessons, more sewing, knitting, cooking, pickling! See my list of the best sewing, embroidery, and mending classes.

• Provide love and support to health professionals and everybody on the front lines. People in Singapore wrote Valentine’s Day notes to hospital employees. See what your local hospitals need but make sure to stay safe. 

• Give back. Buzzfeed News put together a great list of where to provide support during the pandemic. Organizations include No Kid Hungry, UNICEF, and Save the Children. 

• Reach out to people you know are more vulnerable. We will all see and maybe experience our own job loss. According to the CDC, If you, or someone you care about, are feeling overwhelmed with emotions like sadness, depression, or anxiety, or feel like you want to harm yourself or others call 91, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s (SAMHSA’s) Disaster Distress Helpline: 1-800-985-5990 or text TalkWithUs to 66746. (TTY 1-800-846-8517) (for US readers). 

I am hopeful our systems will change and that we will learn to appreciate slow living and slow fashion, each other, and this planet during and after quarantine life. Let me know what you are doing over quarantine. I would also love to connect on how we can change the systems together. Thinking of you all during this time. ♥️