Try this on for size: when it comes to environmental impact, the $2.5 trillion global fashion industry is bursting at the seams, producing more pollution than any other sector, save for oil. College of Arts and Sciences professorial lecturer Angela Geosits is trying to mend the industry, one stitch—and one student—at a time.
In her popular Clothed In-Justice class—one of more than 100 Complex Problems seminars for first-year students—Geosits threads the needle between theory and practice, challenging Eagles to embrace a circular clothing economy while giving them the hands-on skills to make their wardrobes more sustainable.
Geosits learned to knit in eighth grade and started sewing her own garments in grad school. What began as a way to save money became a valuable creative outlet that offered rich insights into her relationship with clothing. “You look at your garments differently when you intimately know the labor that went into their creation,” she says.
Students examine the life cycle of clothing, including the sourcing of raw materials, manufacture in factories, and distribution around the globe, and conduct a closet audit to determine how their wardrobes express their identity and values. They also explore the environmental, labor, and social justice issues plaguing the industry.
The class concludes with a mending workshop. Geosits—who partners with AU’s Office of Sustainability to offer the workshop twice a year for faculty and staff—helps students diagnose the problem and teaches them how to fix it.
With 92 million tons of clothing tossed each year—a figure that’s predicted to jump to 134 million tons by 2030—“The most sustainable garment you’ll ever own is the one that’s already in your closet,” Geosits says. “I want students to learn to be good stewards of the clothing they already have.”
Fashion Fashion: A Timeline
1845: American Elias Howe demonstrates his mechanical sewing machine. At 250 stitches per minute, his lockstitch mechanism outpaces five hand sewers known for their speed.
1851: Isaac Singer unveils what will become the modern-day sewing machine with a foot pedal and up-and-down needle. Three years later, Howe takes Singer to court for patent infringement, winning a share of Singer’s profits.
1870: A Scottish tailor establishes the McCall Pattern Company. Today, McCall’s prints 30 million patterns per year—down from its peak of 200 million in the 1970s.
1872: Aaron Montgomery Ward pioneers the mail-order catalog.
1873: Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis patent metal rivets to help strengthen men’s work pants—and blue jeans are born. Today, the average American woman owns seven pairs of jeans (the average man has four), each of which take about 1,800 gallons of water to produce.
1909: Conde Montrose Nast buys the high-society journal Vogue and transforms it into the country’s first women’s fashion magazine. Known for its September issue, which coincides with New York Fashion Week, Vogue publishes its thickest book ever—916 pages—in 2012.
1911: At the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in New York City, a fire kills 146 people, mostly immigrant women. The catastrophe prompts improved safety standards and spurs the growth of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union.
1924: Nearly 70 years after its founding as a dry goods store, Macy’s Herald Square location becomes the largest store in the world at 2.5 million square feet—half of which is retail space. In May 2024, Macy’s announces that it will close 150 stores, or 30 percent of its remaining locations.
1934: Inspired by Parisian merchandisers, Fred Lazarus Jr., of the Columbus, Ohio–based Lazarus department store chain, becomes the first retailer to arrange clothing by size rather than style in American stores.
1938: DuPont introduces nylon, the first synthetic fiber, which is durable and inexpensive but not biodegradable.
1956: The first indoor shopping mall opens in Edina, Minnesota. Within four years there are 4,500 across the US—however, it’s predicted that by 2030, only 150 indoor malls will remain.
1960: Americans toss 1.7 million tons of textiles into landfills, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. By 2018, that jumps to 11.3 million tons (another 2.5 million tons are recycled).
1989: The New York Times coins the phrase “fast fashion” to describe Zara’s goal of getting a garment from design to stores in just 15 days.
1993: Patagonia debuts its recycled polyester fleece in soda-bottle green, becoming the first outdoor-clothing manufacturer to turn trash into fashion. Nearly 30 years later, founder Yvon Chouinard makes headlines when he transfers ownership of the $3 billion company to a trust and nonprofit to fight climate change.
1994: The North American Free Trade Agreement, which eliminates most import restrictions and duties on foreign-made clothing, prompts American retailers to shift manufacturing operations to the Global South.
2002: Amazon expands to apparel, selling 106,000 pairs of pants that year. Today, the fashion industry accounts for 20 percent of total online retail sales.
2009: ThredUp, an online consignment and thrift store, launches to recirculate unwanted clothing. The company has since processed 172 million garments.
2013: An eight-story garment factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh, collapses, killing 1,134 workers and injuring more than 2,500.
Canopy, an environmental nonprofit, launches its CanopyStyle initiative to highlight the fashion industry’s impact on global deforestation. Today, 515 brands worth $803 billion have eliminated ancient and endangered forests from their supply chains for viscose, rayon, and other fabrics.
2015: According to the documentary The True Cost, the world consumes 80 billion new pieces of clothing each year—400 percent more than in 1995.
2017: A report from the International Union for Conservation of Nature estimates that 35 percent of microplastics in the ocean come from laundering polyester and other synthetic textiles.
2019: The United Alliance for Sustainable Fashion launches to address the environmental havoc caused by the industry, which is responsible for 10 percent of global carbon emissions—more than all international air travel and maritime shipping combined.
Stella McCartney and Adidas debut a biodegradable tennis dress made from cellulose-blended yarn and Microsilk, which mimics the silk produced by spiders.
2020: Fast fashion juggernaut H&M Group tops 5,000 locations worldwide. The Swedish company churns out 3 billion garments a year.
2022: Sustainable clothing claims 4.3 percent of the market—up from 2.83 percent in 2017.