Read on Vegans, Baby
Written by Diana Edelman
What if the most sustainable thing you could do with your closet had nothing to do with what you bought next?
Designer Ruby Jones built her entire namesake label around that idea. She makes fewer pieces, makes them well, and designs them to survive a decade of wear instead of a season of trend cycles.
These trend cycles brought about by fast fashion are incredibly damaging.
The US generated 17 million tons of textile waste in 2018, the most recent year the EPA has published textile-specific data, and a Government Accountability Office report from December 2024 found 66 percent of it went straight to landfills, with only 15 percent recycled.
That same report found textile waste rose more than 50 percent between 2000 and 2018. Globally, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation estimates a garbage truck’s worth of clothing gets landfilled or burned every second. That adds up to more than $400 billion worth of usable clothing thrown away every year.
Thankfully, shoppers are shifting.
ThredUp’s 2026 Resale Report projects the global secondhand apparel market will reach $393 billion by 2030, growing twice as fast as the overall apparel market. Buying less and buying secondhand isn’t a niche habit anymore.
Creating a sustainable fashion line
And Jones is right there to make sure of it.
The designer studied Fiber Science and Apparel Design at Cornell, then spent two years designing womenswear at Thom Browne before moving through more of New York’s luxury fashion houses. Her time in the luxury market showed her how much gets thrown away to keep the trend cycle turning, and it’s what pushed her toward a slower model.
Her Ruby Jones brand creates only two collections a year, using natural and recycled materials, and repurposes production waste. The label grew out of Ruby Jones the person, someone who spent her childhood in rural Great Barrington, Massachusetts, building and collecting things long before she ever built a clothing line.
Why longevity may be the most overlooked part of sustainable fashion
“If you shop fast fashion and wear your clothes for years, it is more sustainable than buying ‘sustainable’ fashion and disposing of it regularly,” said Jones. “At the end of the day, sustainability is about the customer saying no to continuous consumption and wearing their clothing longer.”
That doesn’t let brands off the hook.
Production practices, material choices, and packaging all shape a garment’s footprint. But Jones points out that those choices tend to produce a specific, practical result. Slow fashion brands make higher-quality garments, and higher quality is simply easier to hold onto.
What to look for in a garment built to last
Jones breaks longevity into two parts—durability and construction, and style.
“Discovering your personal style, and dressing to feel good, is so much better for the earth than endlessly keeping up with the trends of others,” she said.
When it comes to fabric, Jones believes it’s the “single most important part of sustainable design,” she said. “Where and how fabric is milled, how long it lasts, and how it ultimately breaks down all shape its footprint on the planet.”
Plastic-based fabrics like polyester and nylon take centuries to break down and require heavy energy and toxic chemicals to produce. Natural materials, like cotton, are renewable. They can be grown again and again. At the end of a garment’s life, natural fibers return nutrients to the soil. Synthetic fibers release microplastics and chemicals. And we all know where those go.
Ruby Jones’s tips for a wardrobe built to last
Jones shared her tips for building a wardrobe that lasts for seasons.
