ABSTRACT
You probably need to be naked to read this paragraph with a clear conscience. Its author, for one, felt like stripping off as his exploration of the fashion system progressed. It took 700 gallons of fresh water to make my cotton T-shirt, I learned. It’s partly down to me that 85 per cent of the Aral Sea in Uzbekistan has disappeared (because its water is used to grow cotton in the desert). A quarter of all the insecticides in the world are used on cotton crops. Nearly all the textiles in my life will end up in landfill – clothes, household textiles, carpets, the lot (Fletcher and Grose, 2012).
