I bought some sunglasses from [a fast fashion brand] in Ireland when I was studying there in 2013, and a week later, the Rana Plaza collapse in Bangladesh, which was the worst accident in garment industry history, happened. The fast fashion brand was one of the brands that had been producing in that factory. Even though that fast fashion purchase was far from my norm, it really shook me to feel like my purchase was implicated in that tragedy. It wasn't hard to stop buying fast fashion after that because I was already so much more of a vintage shopper, but it was sobering to come to terms with the way that Western consumption habits contribute to suffering in the rest of the world. We can't buy our way out of this problem: we need to be willing to change not just where we're buying from, but how much we're buying in the first place. Most of the people reading this probably don't actually need any new clothes, and won't for years. Myself included. If I am buying new — which happens less and less frequently these days — I gravitate towards things that are made from recycled materials , materials that are regeneratively farmed or organic."