Fashioning sustainability: Navigating the perceptions and attitudes in fashion design

Abstract

Trends, elegance, and rapid consumption have long been connected to the fashion business, creating serious environmental and societal problems. Fashion designers are essential in guiding the industry toward a more sustainable future as the necessity for sustainable practices becomes more and more obvious. The purpose of this research was to investigate more about fashion designers' opinions on sustainable fashion (SF) and the challenges they face when trying to put sustainable design (SD) concepts into practice. Fifty fashion designers were selected to take part in an exploratory study and were interviewed throughout five sessions. The research's major findings show that it's challenging to include SD in the fashion design (FD) process for several internal and external factors. Internal issues include a lack of consensus and knowledge regarding SD, as well as projected trade-offs with other aspects of design goals, including aesthetic styles, budgetary limits, and current trends in fashion. Some examples of such external barriers include the intricacy of sustainability issues, the impression of insufficient customer demand, the existence of deficiencies in customer views and actions regarding the purchase of sustainable collection ranges, and the absence of either monetary or legal incentives for businesses to employ SD methods. The results of this study add to our knowledge of the perspectives and attitudes that fashion designers have regarding sustainability, providing insightful information for those who are involved in the industry, policymakers, and educators. This research aims to enable the incorporation of sustainable practices into fashion design, eventually guiding the industry toward a more responsible and sustainable future by addressing the issues and offering practical solutions.