More Than Fabric: Personal Style, Sustainable Fashion, and Intentional Shopping

Earlier this month, I had the opportunity to speak on a TEDx Las Vegas panel called More Than Fabric, alongside designers, models, and vintage curators discussing the future of fashion, sustainability, and personal style.

Through my work with Rotate, a Las Vegas-based sustainable fashion brand focused on secondhand clothing, upcycling, textile reuse, and helping people build more intentional wardrobes, I spend a lot of time thinking about the emotional relationship people have with clothing.

And one thing that stood out immediately during the panel was how many of us shared the same starting point. Around 2016, something shifted. We all became more aware of the fashion industry in different ways. For some people it was learning about labor practices. For others it was seeing the environmental impact of textile waste and fashion overproduction.

For me, it was seeing photos of discarded clothing piling up in Chile’s Atacama Desert and realizing our clothes do not simply disappear because we no longer want them.

That realization completely changed how I viewed clothing.

Not only environmentally, but also emotionally.

Because fashion is not only about clothes. It is about identity, aspiration, belonging, creativity, insecurity, expression, and consumption all happening at the same time.

And I think that is why conversations around sustainable fashion sometimes feel overwhelming. We are not just asking people to shop differently, it comes down to consumer behaviors that havent been addressed in decades.

Personal Style vs. Trend Culture

One of the questions I was asked during the TEDx Las Vegas panel was what I hope people understand before I even speak when they see me or my work.

My answer: I hope they see the human behind it.

I do not want my work to feel overly polished or perfect. I want it to feel touched by human hands because it was. I want people to see that clothing can tell stories through repairs, alterations, imperfections, and history.

Somewhere along the way, fashion became heavily focused on perfection and constant newness. Trend cycles move faster than ever. Entire wardrobes are being built around one microtrend, one vacation, one event, or one version of ourselves that disappears six months later. And honestly, I think a lot of people are exhausted by that, me included

I do not think most people actually have a shopping problem. I think a lot of people have become disconnected from their personal style. There is a difference.

Why Secondhand Fashion Feels Different

During the panel, I talked about why I often recommend people walk into a thrift store with absolutely no intention to buy anything.

Just observe.

Because unlike traditional retail stores, thrift stores are not presenting you with a perfectly curated trend forecast. They are not telling you which colors are “in” this season or what aesthetic you should suddenly care about.

You are looking at decades of clothing all existing together at once.

And that environment creates something really interesting: freedom.

Secondhand shopping forces you to rely more on instinct than marketing. You start paying attention to what you are actually drawn to instead of what you were told to want.

I think that is why secondhand fashion feels so personal for a lot of people. It becomes less about trend participation and more about self-discovery.

Fashion Has Become Disposable

Another major conversation during the panel centered around how normalized disposable fashion has become.

We buy outfits for one event all the time now. One birthday dinner. One concert. One conference. One vacation photo.

And the scary part is how normal that feels.

The average piece of clothing is worn shockingly few times before it is discarded, despite the massive amount of labor, transportation, water usage, and production resources required to create it.

The fashion industry has normalized overconsumption while simultaneously making it difficult to fully understand the scale of clothing overproduction and textile waste happening behind the scenes.

We have also normalized treating clothing damage as the end of a garment’s life instead of the beginning of its next version.

A stain used to mean you patched something, dyed it, cropped it, repaired it, or transformed it into something else. Now it often means replacement.

That mindset reinforces the idea that clothing itself is disposable.

But it is not.

These materials stay here long after we are done with them.

The Future of Fashion Is More Personal

One of my favorite parts of the conversation was discussing where fashion is heading next.

Personally, I do not think the future of fashion is hyper-minimal capsule wardrobes where everyone owns the same five neutral basics.

I think we are moving toward curated wardrobes instead.

There is a difference.

A curated wardrobe is personal. It evolves with you. It can be maximal, experimental, vintage-heavy, colorful, sentimental, dramatic, understated, or constantly changing. The important part is that it actually feels connected to the person wearing it.

I also think fashion is becoming more community-driven again.

You see it everywhere right now:

• run clubs

• book clubs

• craft nights

• sewing groups

• mending events

• DIY workshops

People are craving connection again. And fashion is quietly becoming part of that shift.

Clothing is moving away from pure consumption and back toward participation.

And honestly, I think that is exciting.

In Las Vegas especially, I think there is a growing opportunity for sustainable fashion communities, secondhand events, upcycling workshops, clothing swaps, and creative spaces where people can reconnect with what they already own instead of constantly feeling pressured to buy more.

That is really the space I try to create through Rotate.

The 30 Wears Rule

At the end of the panel, we were asked what shift we hope people make after conversations like these.

For me, it comes down to intentionality.

One thing I always come back to is what I call the 30 wears rule.

Before buying something, I ask myself:

Will I realistically wear this at least 30 times?

Not because every purchase needs to be perfect. Not because people should never shop for fun. And definitely not because sustainable fashion should feel restrictive or joyless.

But because that question forces me to slow down long enough to figure out whether I actually like something or whether I just like the idea of it in one moment.

That single shift changed the way I shop and the way I value what I already own.

Because ultimately, the goal is not perfection.

The goal is connection.

Connection to your clothes, your personal style, your creativity, your community, and the choices you make around all of it.