Vintage stylist Beth Jones & Dounia Wone of Vestiaire Collective on whether fast fashion brands fit into the resale experience

In episode 314, you’ll hear our first official roundtable format, featuring guests Beth Jones, YouTube star and creator of B. Jones Style, alongside Dounia Wone, the Chief Impact Officer at Vestiaire Collective, a platform that showcases luxury preloved fashion.

“It’s few and far between that the fast fashion holds up against vintage or really quality pieces maybe made by a designer or things like that … Even if it has a vintage look to it, there’s something about it that doesn’t hold up in a way. And honestly, I will be a little bummed. It’s Zara. I’d rather have the old Kathys of California blazer or dress. I end up not being excited about it, so often, I just go with something else instead.” -Beth

“Vestiaire is a 15 year old company. Our founders really believed in fighting overconsumption and overproduction back then in Paris … When I went to them and said ‘ok, let’s ban fast fashion,’ they were completely in … what we want is that it will educate the consumers on our platform. What we were looking at is the behavior … what we saw for the last year was actually people are staying on the platform, 70% of the people who were impacted by the ban stayed on the platform and actually reinvested more and bought less.” -Dounia

JANUARY THEME —
Fast Fashion, Consumption & Why Self Work Is Integral To Changemaking

When we talk about the messes of the fashion industry, a recurring theme we circle back to is – OVERPRODUCTION – especially with regard to fast fashion. Whether you’re super interested in sustainability and fashion or you’re new to the conversation, most people today are coming to the basic conclusion that fast fashion is problematic, due to its incessant mass production.

There has been a lot of commentary over the last 7 years, about I guess, the questioning of our moral compass, when it comes to how we shop for fast fashion. What do I mean by that? Let’s break it down. 

We know that fast fashion is everywhere, and that so much of our clothing ends up in charity shops, where sadly, a great deal of it is destined for landfill. 

• So, to address this cycle, does it make sense to buy fast fashion from the secondhand economy? Can we then prevent these clothes from ending up in landfills? 

It’s not that simple.

Other questions come up like –

• “If we adopt the same shopping behaviors in the secondhand economy as we have with fast fashion, what really changes? Where do we draw the line?”

Or

• Aren’t we just encouraging the fast fashion industry to churn out more *stuff* to feed the overproducing system it has generated?

In this week's episode, we chat with two incredible powerhouse women from very different realms of the fashion industry. They each contribute so much to helping dissect this tension – 

• We explore the layers of responsibility we hold as everyday individuals

• The power organizations hold in enacting change

• And how lobbying and legislation is an integral part of fashioning a better future for fashion. 

We also discuss the power of personal style and how we can all start shifting our buying behavior by ‘Always Playing Dress Up’. Sound familiar? One of our guests coined that very phrase.

Tune in as we dive deeper into our January theme – Fast Fashion, Consumption & Why Self Work Is Integral To Changemaking. 

Quotes & links from the conversation:

• “Not-So-Fast Fashion: Embracing Responsible Consumption Through Online Activism”, article by Dounia that Nat mentions

• B. Jones Style Website

• Vestiaire Collective Website

• Beth’s YouTube

• Follow Beth on TikTok

• Follow Vestiaire on TikTok

• Follow Beth on Instagram

• Follow Dounia on Instagram

• Follow Vestiaire Collective on Instagram