The global fashion industry is coming together to highlight the challenges of the fashion supply chain, from exploitation to pollution, with the inaugural Fashion Revolution Day this Thursday April 24.
A series of events and initiatives around the world will highlight issues in the fashion industry and demand greater transparency, inspired by the first anniversary of the Rana Plaza factory complex collapse. 1,133 people were killed and many more were injured when the factory collapsed in Dhaka, Bangladesh last year.
According to last year's Australian Fashion Report, 61 per cent of companies surveyed don't know where their garments are made. That's why Fashion Revolution Day is asking people one simple question: 'Who Made Your Clothes?'
People all over the world — from designers and academics to any other individual who cares about what they wear — are being asked to wear an item of clothing inside out, photograph it, and then share it with the hashtag #insideout on all social networks. (Yes, it's one of THOSE 'awareness' campaigns, but this one seems to have a point.)
Fashion icon Akira Isogawa, Oxfam Global Ambassador Livia Firth, author Marion von Adlerstein, 1 Million Women founder Natalie Isaacs, artist and designer Liane Rossler, model Amanda Rootsey, and retail expert and broadcaster Mary Portas are among the notable names taking part in the campaign.
A series of global 'social media takeovers' — hosted by @Fash_Rev and @Fash_Rev_AUSNZ — will be held on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram on the day, including Q&A sessions with Greenpeace, Fair Trade Foundation and Centre For Sustainable Fashion UK.
"The idea for Fashion Revolution Day came to me in the bath," says founder Cary Somers. "I saw that the Rana Plaza disaster could act as a catalyst, with the heightened awareness around ethical fashion providing a window to bring about real change. Fashion Revolution Day represents an exciting opportunity to reconnect fashion-lovers with the people who made their clothes."
Co-founder Orsola de Castro adds: "With one simple gesture, #insideout, we want you to ask: 'Who Made Your Clothes?' This action will encourage people to imagine the 'thread' from the garment to the machinist that sewed it and all the way down to the farmer that grew the cotton it was made from. We hope that Fashion Revolution Day will initiate a process of discovery, raising awareness of the fact that buying is only the last step in a long journey involving hundreds of people: the invisible workforce behind the clothes we wear."
