WEBVTT
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Hello
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A few years ago,
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I bought this dress
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for fifteen dollars.
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Bargain!
(Laughter)
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I was going out to meet up
with some friends.
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I thought, my friends,
they know all my other dresses.
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I'm gonna need something new.
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And naturally, I went and picked up
something new.
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Before I continue,
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I’d like to ask you all to consider
what you're wearing today.
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Where it’s from,
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and if you remember
what was on the tag.
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Because little did I know,
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that there were seven sneaky facts
about the dress that I just bought.
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This dress is made
of cotton and polyester.
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To grow enough cotton
to create this dress,
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you need 10,000 liters of water.
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That’s a small swimming pool.
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To bleach and dye this dress,
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toxins are run off into
Chinese ecosystems, killing wildlife.
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The design process
of this dress created waste.
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This waste is called “off-cuts”.
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And usually it’s traded as rubbish
and sent straight to land field.
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This dress was made in China,
in a sweatshop.
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It was most likely made by someone,
who works 16 hours a day
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with less than minimum pay.
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Last year, there was a factory collapse
in Bangladesh,
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which killed a thousand people
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because the health and safety standards
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weren't up to scratch.
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The distribution of this dress,
the carbon footprint, I should say,
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is huge.
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Often a dress will start in Europe,
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it will then source material from India,
will then flight to China
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to be manufactured,
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well then often come back to Europe
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to have hand-made
or more finer details added to it.
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And then, it's shipped
around the world for retail.
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Collectively,
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Australians purchase one billion items
of clothing per year.
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There is 22 million of us,
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which makes it nearly an item per week.
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Do we really need that many clothes?
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Did I need to buy this particular dress?
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The company I bought this dress from
doesn't have a recycling scheme.
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Unfortunately, 5 % of our land field
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is made up of an unwanted
clothing and textiles.
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My name is Edda.
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I am the director of Undress Runways,
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a sustainable fashion show
here in Brisbane,
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and now Melbourne.
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I discovered sustainable fashion
four years ago
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when I saw our local designers
were doing great things
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with very little support.
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We curate sustainable daywear,
evening wear, lingerie, and swimwear
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from around the world.
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We bring these clothes together
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to one location
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on one night
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once a year
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Think organic fibers,
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garments dyed with turmeric and red wine,
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zero-waste collections,
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ethically produced garments,
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bamboo underwear,
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and much more.
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At Undress Brisbane,
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we started off
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by taking it off.
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And we began to think more sustainably
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about the way
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we create our clothes
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and shop.
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If you don’t know where it was made,
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where it came from,
or where it will end up,
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take it off.
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What I'm wearing now
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is what we call "sustainable fashion".
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It is made from bamboo,
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which only requires rain water to grow.
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It is treated with
a low water-dying process.
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and the waste water is recycled
to preserve our ecosystems.
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It is made of off-cuts.
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These three sections are actually off-cuts
from another collection.
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And the off-cuts of the off-cuts
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are then used
in the rest of the collection.
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It is made in Australia.
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in a place that has
healthy working conditions
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and with fair pay.
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It came from Melbourne.
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They're off-cuts
from a designer in Melbourne
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and it was made here in Brisbane.
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So the carbon footprint was much lower.
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The use phase:
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I always wash this on cold
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and it use non-toxic laundry detergent
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to conserve water and the environment.
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Actually, I borrowed
this dress from a friend.
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So, I will be returning it to her later today.
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Borrowing clothes is actually a very
sustainable way to pick your next outfit.
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I'm passionate about changing
the fashion industry,
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about providing
sustainable clothing options,
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and supporting designers
who are doing the right thing.
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Everything you are wearing today
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has a story
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with contributors.
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And change comes
from people like you,
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the everyday consumers of clothing.
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And together,
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we can change the fashion industry.
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Sustainable fashion is like turning
the lights off when you leave your room.
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It's like turning the tap off
when you’re brushing your teeth.
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And it’s like using chemist bags
when you go shopping.
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It is an easy choice we can all make.
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Next time you go shopping,
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have a look at the tag.
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And think about where
this piece of clothing came from.
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My Australian dream
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is to create a world where we,
the consumers of fashion,
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use our dollar
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to vote for a sustainable
fashion industry.
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An industry where we treat
our fellow human beings
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as worthy individuals
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and take care of our Earth
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because we've only got one.
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So remember,
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you’ve always got the option
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to take it off.
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[Applause]