What this summer’s viral Zara dress tells us about fast fashion

In years gone by being seen in the same dress as another woman would have been veritable sartorial suicide

You’ve definitely seen it. You know the one, it’s a calf-skimming, long sleeved, round neck white dress with scattered black polka dots and a ruffled hem. It’s the dress that has taken over the UK this summer: the omnipresent dress. The dress.

The £39.99 number from Zara is so popular that it even has its own Instagram account: Hot 4 The Spot collates snaps of “the dress” submitted by eagle-eyed fashion fans across Britain. I got in the lift with a grand total of three of them at Independent HQ just this week.

In years gone by – in the era of cruel “Who Wore it Best?” weekly features – being seen in the same dress as another woman would have been veritable sartorial suicide. How could you possibly have made such a blunder? But recent shifts in feminist thinking have brought with them a sense of sisterly solidarity – one that extends even to our wardrobes (the three dotted Graces in the lift were thrilled, not mortified as you might have expected).

Far from representing a homogenisation of our wardrobes, the takeover of this particular garment feels like a positive moment at a time when the rocket speed of trend turnover poses a direct threat to the future of our planet.

A survey by Barnardo’s published this week revealed that Britions are expected to spend more than £2.7bn this summer on outfits they will wear just once, with one in four reporting they’d feel embarrassed to wear the same ensemble to more than one special occasion.

I often feel that fast fashion gets a harder ride than other planet-threatening industries that aren’t as female dominated. Streaming pornography online, for example – among other issues – produces an annual global carbon footprint greater than the entirety of Belgium.

Eating meat and flying are both shocking offenders and get far less of a tough time than they ought. But there’s something quite affirming about seeing women all over proudly sporting the same dress in an apparent rejection of the shame that has facilitated fuelling the throwaway fashion culture that has reigned for so long.

Will we tire of treating ourselves to the latest fashions? I don’t see that happening any time soon, but what is clear is that consumers are demanding more – and better – from brands, be that in the fabrics they use, the practices they employ or the transparency they ought to have.

Rejecting the idea that outfit repeating and twinning is something to be remotely ashamed of is just one part of this.

On the surface, a high street dress taking over the nation might seem like people worshipping at the altar of fleeting trends, but an optimist would see this dotty ubiquity as the collective appreciation of a practical and classic style that they’re not afraid to wear time and again – and around a bunch of other people wearing the exact same thing.

Something tells me the dress isn’t going away any time soon.

Yours,

Harriet Hall
Lifestyle Editor