Zoe Gilbertson on Bioregional Fibersheds & New Fashion Commons
Nov 1, 2024
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Zoe Gilbertson, a British fashion ecologist, is revolutionizing the fashion industry through sustainable practices like bioregional fibersheds, focusing on crops such as hemp and flax. She discusses her journey from conventional fashion to promoting localized garment production, tackling the ecological harms of fast fashion. The conversation highlights innovative European enterprises, the balance of imagination and practicality in sustainable farming, and the importance of community-driven systems. Gilbertson champions a fashion revolution that fosters ecological practices and celebrates local craftsmanship.
Zoe Gilbertson emphasizes the importance of localized textile production using sustainable fibers like hemp and flax to combat fast fashion's ecological impacts.
The podcast discusses the role of community collaboration and the commons in fostering innovative, equitable, and sustainable fashion systems.
Deep dives
Transforming the Fashion Industry
The podcast emphasizes the urgent need to transform the fashion industry into a more localized and eco-friendly model. This change is driven by growing awareness of the severe pollution and unethical labor practices associated with conventional fashion production, particularly in the global south. Initiatives like the Bast Fiber Network focus on developing alternative systems that prioritize environmental sustainability and fair labor practices. By creating localized fiber production systems and fostering community collaboration, these projects aim to build a fashion model that benefits both local economies and the planet.
Bioregional Resilience Through Bast Fibers
The concept of bioregional resilience plays a crucial role in transforming textile production by encouraging the use of locally sourced fibers such as flax and hemp. Research conducted through a Churchill Fellowship explores methods to support local fiber production, merging ecological practices with community economies. By understanding the unique capacity of the land, initiatives can cultivate fibers that are both sustainable and regionally appropriate, creating a distributed textile economy. This approach emphasizes the need for local production over global supply chains, advocating for environmental sustainability and economic regeneration.
Innovative Community-Driven Models
The podcast highlights several innovative community projects that exemplify successful bioregional fiber production and distribution models. Projects in places like France and the UK are dedicated to establishing integrated systems that combine food production, construction materials, and textiles, showcasing vertical integration. Examples include a French initiative that utilizes hemp sustainably while building a holistic economic system and the Fantasy Fiber Mill in Scotland, which focuses on grassroots textile processing. These models suggest that smaller, community-owned operations can effectively compete with large-scale global production through collaboration and innovative approaches.
The Role of Commons in Fashion
A significant theme in the podcast is the role of the commons in facilitating a sustainable fashion landscape. By sharing resources, knowledge, and community, the concept of the commons encourages collaboration to overcome the challenges posed by the existing economic system. Networks such as Our Commons.Market aim to create spaces for community-centered fashion initiatives while fostering local connections. The podcast emphasizes that the future of fashion requires cooperative efforts that align environmental and social values to create equitable systems.
Zoe Gilbertson is a British fashion ecologist who is re-imagining the fashion industry from the ground up, literally. In an effort to curb the ecological harms of fast fashion, global supply chains, and relentless consumption of clothes, Gilbertson is figuring how fiber crops like hemp and flax could be grown bioregionally to produce textiles and, in the process, catalyze localized garment design, production, and distribution as well as bioregional clothing cultures. This vision is part of a larger, expanding movement of fashion innovators who are incubating "seed to closet" initiatives, traditional clothing crafts, mending and upcycling projects, and other types of fashion commons. More on Gilbertson: https://liflad.substack.com. More on the commons: https://www.bollier.org.
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