CHANGE

The overarching objective of the project is to examine consumption by investigating how people wear, change and replace clothes in Norway and globally in order to better understand the increasing volumes of clothing, and the potential to reduce them. In doing so, this project endeavors to achieve the following objectives:
1) Theoretical development of occasions, variety of garments, and clothing quantity in wardrobes.
2) Knowledge of clothing acquisition and the importance of consumption and the use-phase in environmental debates in general. 3) Develop empirical knowledge of clothing consumption locally and globally in the past and present.
4) Strengthen the collaboration, recruitment and development of clothing researchers globally.
5) Devise a critical opportunity for change on an aggregated level, based on a better understanding of why and how people change clothes in daily practices, and hopefully reduce production and consumption volumes.

Project summary
Environmental impacts from the clothing sector have increased rapidly within the last 20 years, with clothing consumption as an important driver. Yet, research on consumption, the use of clothes and how this impacts the volume, is limited. By studying changes in clothing consumption today, based on the past 200 years, CHANGE will contribute to an understanding of the material flow of clothing in and out of wardrobes, through the relationship between 3 pillars: ‘occasions’ , the ‘wardrobe’ and the volume of clothes acquired and disposed of.
CHANGE is an interdisciplinary project supported by a consortium of academics from consumption research, fashion, history and design with a diversity of methods linking detailed qualitative analysis with broader quantifiable consequences. The project will primarily focus on Norwegian clothing consumption and start with a historical perspective on clothing standards. Moving to the present, we will study men's and women's clothing consumption in parallel with detailed wardrobe studies. Norwegian wardrobes, with consumers of different socio-economic backgrounds will be contrasted with wardrobe studies of consumers in the Netherlands and Uruguay, enabling comparisons between similar consumer groups, but in additionally taking into account the differences in occasions caused by climate and cultural differences. A further international analysis will be conducted based on quantitative material on wardrobes from the largest consumer markets; the UK, the US, Germany, Japan and China.
Developing theoretical and methodological tools, the project has a threefold approach: 1) Insight on clothing consumption from a historical and contemporary analysis, 2) Identifying environmental impacts and provide a systems change perspective and 3) Academic and societal impact through recruitment to the academic research community and dissemination of knowledge regarding clothing and the environment to the general public and stakeholders.