How Much Do We Really Know About Fashion’s Environmental Cost?

Sustainability is one of fashion’s most familiar words. We see it on clothing labels, campaign pages and resale platforms, but knowing the language is not necessarily the same as knowing the facts.

During one of ViWear’s Welcome Week events at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam this August, we asked 120 students to take a five question quiz on fashion and its environmental impact. Only two participants answered every question correctly. Across the group, the average score was just 16 percent, with most students getting either none or one of the questions right.

The result turned a simple campus challenge into a much more interesting conversation. Students who came over expecting a quick quiz often stayed to talk about the answers, and many were surprised by the scale of fashion’s environmental impact. That surprise was perhaps the most revealing result of all.

Clothes are among the most ordinary things in our lives. We buy them, wear them and eventually clear them out, yet much of what happens before and after they enter our wardrobes remains remarkably easy to overlook.