ELIZABETH CLINE + THE CONSCIOUS CLOSET

In episode 181, Kestrel welcomes New York-based author, journalist, and expert on consumer culture, fast fashion, sustainability and labor rights, Elizabeth Cline, back to the show. You may already know of Elizabeth from her widely read book, Overdressed: The Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion; and she recently released a follow-up book called The Conscious Closet: A Revolutionary Guide to Looking Good While Doing Good.

“The book in a lot of ways is very informed by moving away from fast fashion — so, really remembering that clothing is not a disposable good, because it just requires too many resources and too much energy to create.” - Elizabeth Cline, Author of Overdressed + The Conscious Closet

On this week’s show, Elizabeth shares with us what she’s been working on, as well as her perspective on how much the fashion industry has shifted, since the last time she was on the show, almost 4 years ago.

Kestrel + Elizabeth dive into some of the inspiration and details about her new book, The Conscious Closet. For Elizabeth, a lot of what drove the direction for her new book was her education on the secondhand market globally, and how clothing cannot be considered a disposable product.

Also, in this chat, Elizabeth reveals some of her favorite ways to personally build a conscious closet.

The below thoughts, ideas + organizations were brought up in this chat:

• “I understand the power of personal style because of conscious fashion, not in spite of it.”

• “And over time, it became more about, ‘wait — if we question the industrial food system, then the result of that, is that we also get to rebuild our food culture,’ and that is what’s happening with fashion — we are deciding as a community that clothing can be about more than mindless consumption and chasing the lowest price and buying whatever companies tell us to buy.”

• The Buyerarchy Of Needs by Sarah Lazarovic

• Some of Elizabeth’s favorite places to shop secondhand online: Poshmark, thredUp + The RealReal

• LA FRIENDS | Get Tickets for The Conscious Closet event featuring Elizabeth Cline at The Helms Design Center on October 27th from 2-4pm