Bristol’s Sustainable Fashion Week makes global impact

A green initiative born in a UK city has proven so successful it has expanded globally.

Sustainable Fashion Week (SFW) launched in Bristol in 2021, to challenge the environmental impact of the industry during London Fashion Week.

It has since tripled in size, with events happening around the UK and in India, Papua New Guinea and the US.

Priyanka Abhishek, from SFW India, said the initiative was helping Indians to “get back to their roots”.

After the success of last year’s event, Dr Abhishek and her friend Laghna Gowda approached SFW Bristol based founder Amelia Twine to see if they could run its Indian arm.

“That’s a great thing and there’s no limits on what Sustainable Fashion Week can do, who we can work with and how big we can get,” said Ms Twine.

“We will go as global as we can.”

SFW was also approached by designer Elizabeth Omeri to launch the scheme in Papua New Guinea, and have also partnered with SFW USA.

Ms Twine said “the sense of coming together” was really important for the the future of the fashion industry, which is responsible for 8-10% of global emissions.

Fast-fashion production has led to an increase in waste and pollution, and the exploitation of garment workers in both the UK and overseas factories, including India, has been further exposed in recent years.

Dr Abishek explained fast-fashion was changing thousands of years of cultural clothing in her country.

“We always saw our mothers and grandmothers in saris, and it’s all handloom textiles. We always had a tailor who stitched our dresses with handmade laces.”

But when she started university this changed “because that’s when the fast-fashion got introduced”.

The theme for this year’s Sustainable Fashion Week, which ran from 25 September to 8 October, was The Re-wear Revolution, focusing on keeping clothing out of landfill and “away from the exploitation ships that go off to the global south”, explained Ms Twine.

Dr Abhishek and Dr Gowda, who both work in dentistry, organised events in Delhi and Bangalore, including upcycling and repurposing workshops, a catwalk show featuring eco-conscious brands and preloved fashion pop-ups.

“A lot of hard work has gone behind this. I’m proud of what we have achieved,” said Dr Abhishek.

“Amelia is doing a fantastic job in Bristol, and how she’s really spread her wings all over the world,” added Dr Gowda.

Dr Gowda explained: “We have so many things which we should have passed down to our future generations which we have lacked, and because of that I had taken to promoting re-wearing clothes, repeating clothes.

“I thought Sustainable Fashion Week would be a great platform to help me promote to others the whole concept of sustainable fashion.”

The pair said the impact was noticeable because Indian brands and designers said they felt they had missed out by not participating this year.

Back in SFW’s hometown, the founders of Bristol’s Rebel Patch and Clothemod held a conversation on repurposing, repairing and upcycling clothing.

Lisa Matzi, from Rebel Patch, said she wanted to be a part of SFW because it was “a whole week where we can collectively, as makers, as activists, really, really make a difference”.

Meg Cox, of Clothemod, added that SFW enables people to “dip their toe into sustainability”, if they are new to it.

Ms Twine explained her “tiny team” works almost completely voluntarily.

“It makes my heart sing looking at what can actually be achieved with just a handful of people who are really committed.”

SFW plans to expand again next year, including its India hub.

“It has reached more people than we expected. We are getting calls from all over India,” said Dr Abhishek.

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