How Japan approaches fashion, circular economy and zero waste

Thinking about making fashion circular isn’t complex. What we want to do is break the linear economy mold of taking from limited resources, unethical production, and finally discard as garbage. We want to cut the ends and “close the loop” to create zero waste and produce responsibly.

We’ve seen many Japanese brands adopting circular ways to bring us ethical fashion. They are good examples of how the fashion industry can shift to close the loop. So let’s round some of them up and see what key concepts lie behind their business model.

Choosing a material that can be circulated easily

The type of material determines both how it is obtained and how it can be circulated. The former will affect the energy and resources required, while the latter will differentiate between waste and reusable resources. Both also have an impact on the environment.

We looked at the trending eco-friendly fabric in Japan, including the popular hemp and Japanese paper, washi. Washi may sound unsuitable for clothing, but Syncs.Design has developed a yarn made of this Japanese paper. They showed us that durable and washable washi are suitable for clothing.

Furthermore, the organic material is biodegradable within three months. Syncs.Design’s business model is one of subscription, meaning there is responsible recovery and composting (in their own farmland, no less!)

Read more about this biodegradable washi clothing brand here.

Extending product life cycle

“Extending product life cycle” is really a fancy term for “making things last.” It can include making clothing more durable or introducing repairs as part of our consumption pattern.

Kyoto city is a fine example of a culture of both secondhand clothing shops and repair stores, with numerous stores located around the beloved shopping street, Teramachidori. A finer example is in the second story of mumokuteki cafe&foods. It is here where the secondhand fashion shop “mori” and repair shop RE;CIRCLE STUDIO are located. There is a strong understanding of the circulation of fashion here, promoting fashion with zero waste.

But RE;CIRCLE also goes beyond repair to offer remake and customization services. Because some old clothes cannot be sold, they remake new clothes under the RE;CIRCLE PROJECT label. And the clothes are stylish! Proving the skill of the artisan in upcycling. Incidentally, this service is a good example of the next method.

Increasing number of cycles that materials go through

Extending product life cycles is great, but the fact remains that there is a limit. However, when something goes beyond repairing, we can extract materials and reuse them for upcycling projects. The zero-waste spirit remains, and we are creating new life cycles through new products. You can even say we are squeezing everything out of a material for as long as we can.

RE;CIRCLE isn’t the only example of this method. MOTHERHOUSE is an international brand that sells fair trade leather bags made by craftspeople in Bangladesh. The materials used in the bags are also locally sourced. The products include handbags, wallets, briefcases, and more.

The brand offers repairs, like sewing or removal of stains, so customers’ leather bags will last as long as possible. MOTHERHOUSE also has a RINNE series, where old leather bags are recovered and used to make new bags. Essentially, the brand takes parts of still-usable leather strips to make one-of-a-kind leather bags, once again displaying the skills of craftspeople.

Read more about MOTHERHOUSE’s service here.

Recovering disused fashion from customers

Businesses can be responsible for producing circular fashion but will still need our help recovering old clothes, torn or disused. With increasing awareness of the fashion industry’s wastefulness, more stores are placing old clothes collection boxes.

There are various initiatives driving the recovery, too. Looking in Kyoto, there is an expanding service, RELEASE⇔CATCH, to place clothes collection boxes, where the clothes are collected and sorted. Part of the system is to encourage exchange and recovery of old clothes within the city, experimenting through a circular festival.

Circular fashion needs your action too!

Ultimately, individual action, your action, is important. You are at the point of deciding when to repair torn clothing. You are at the point of deciding whether to vote with your money by buying ethical fashion. You are at the point of deciding to give away or sell your old clothes. With you, we can close the loop on fashion, and that is pretty powerful.

Podcast version of this article