Climate activist group Extinction Rebellion announced that it’s planning to disrupt the London Fashion Week this September.

Some of the biggest names in the industry, including Burberry, Victoria Beckham, and Molly Goddard, will be attending the weeklong show starting on September 13. 

“Fashion should be a cultural signifier of our times, and yet it still adheres to an archaic system of seasonal fashion and relentless newness at a time of emergency,” Extinction Rebellion wrote on Instagram.

According to the post, in July the activist group sent a letter to the British Fashion Council, which organizes the show, asking to cancel the event and convene “a People’s Assembly of industry professionals [...] to declare a Climate and Ecological Emergency."

“We are planning non-violent direct action civil disobedience,” Extinction Rebellion's Ramón Salgado-Touzón told The Times.

A 2018 report by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) showed that the fashion industry is the world’s second-biggest user of water and produces 20 percent of global wastewater. Producing just one cotton t-shirt requires 2,7000 liters of water.

The $2.5 trillion industry is also responsible for around 10 percent of global Co2 emissions, more than international aviation and maritime shipping combined.

On average, consumers purchase 60% more items of clothing than they did in 2000 but each item is kept half as long on average, and around 40% of garments in our wardrobes are never worn.

“It is clear that the fashion industry needs to change gears. It needs to become environmentally sound,” commented Olga Algayerova, UNECE’s executive secretary.

“Beyond the environmental impact, the fashion industry is closely linked to labour, gender, and poverty issues,” the report concluded.

Credit header picture: Pixabay