Local, Slow and Sustainable Fashion

This book is a tour de force and a heart-on-sleeve exploration of how a familiar fibre can radically change the fashion and sustainability story.

Professor Kate Fletcher, Centre for Sustainable Fashion, London College of Fashion, UK

 The authors of this fascinating book use wool as a lens through which to see important aspects of the contemporary world: corporate capitalism, consumerism, standardisation and their opposites: localised crafts and practices, quality of life, sustainability. Readable, enlightening and engaged, this book is fuelled by a passion for wool and expertly weaves, spins, cards and knits the small and the large scale, contributing not only to our knowledge about fabrics and sustainability, but also adds depth to our understanding of globalisation.

Professor Thomas Hylland Eriksen, Department of Social Anthropology, University of Oslo, Norway

This book explores the importance of the agriculturally-based fiber and textile industry, and how local, small-scale operations and markets, coupled with a connection to soil health, can lead the way to new transformative changes. It draws on a four-year research project on Norwegian wool, as well as similar studies in Poland and Portugal. It also explores the role of women and the Indigenous perspective: in Europe this will constitute Sami and Inuit, in Northern America the Inuit and First Nations in Canada, along with Native Americans.

Born out of academic interest in the slow food movement, the importance of local raw materials has been put under the spotlight in recent years. Meanwhile, the havoc wreaked by the fast fashion industry has been drawing attention to the need for a new, sustainable approach to clothing and textile manufacture. This edited collection is unique in its scope, taking the conversation beyond traditional debates around fast fashion and agriculture, and examining how textile industry is rooted in the land, and within society and community. Featuring a diverse range of authors, the book will be valuable reading for academics interested in sustainable management, the study of consumption, the study of Indigenous perspectives, and the study of agricultural practices.

Ingun Grimstad Klepp is Professor of Clothing and Sustainability affiliated with Consumption Research Norway (SIFO) at Oslo Metropolitan University, Norway. 

Tone Skårdal Tobiasson is a seasoned journalist and editor, and founder of Nordic Initiative Clean & Ethical Fashion.