Signals

Every Friday, we wrap up the topics, issues, ideas and viral moments everyone’s been discussing. This week, senior foresight analyst Alice Crossley critiques Pretty Little Thing’s rebrand and questions whether technology can help save the planet-polluting fashion industry.

: Fast fashion retailer Pretty Little Thing has undergone a rebrand –using a new font and a collection of more conservative, business-casual-skewed clothing (no more pink unicorns or barely-there clubwear) to try to disguise itself as a premium brand. Unfortunately, a new logo, neutral colour scheme and what one critic called ‘old-money cosplay, but polyester’ isn’t much of a distraction from the fact that parent group Boohoo was found to be paying its garment workers £3 ($3.86, €3.57) an hour in 2020 (source: Labour Behind the Label).

: Environmental NGO Wrap has recently published its Textile Displacement report, revealing that buying a second-hand pair of jeans online instead of buying a brand-new pair could save more than 30kg of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent) – the same as making 600 cups of tea. Repairing one cotton t-shirt instead of buying a new one could save more than 7.5kg CO2e – the amount generated by ironing for 25 hours. One for Umar Kamani, CEO of Pretty Little Thing, to add to his reading list…

: In more positive news, I’ve just discovered Loom, the fashion app connecting members of the public with designers to redesign and repair old clothes. The idea of using technology to facilitate more environmentally conscious consumer behaviour is the topic of our new Sustainability is Dead report, which outlines the new language and strategies brands and businesses need to adopt to restore meaning to the word ‘sustainability’ and better promote responsible consumption. Perhaps Kamani should read this one too.