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Happy 2024!

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New Year’s Resolution: Empathy and Sharing

suite123 team wishes you a happy 2024!

At suite123, we are not just a boutique; we are a tiny hub of style and creativity committed to a ‘less but better’ lifestyle.
In fact, our niche boutique isn’t just about fashion, it is about fostering connections and understanding.

As we step into 2024, we are thrilled to share our New Year’s resolution with you.

This year, amid escalating reports of conflicts, violence against women, and patriarchy still dominating. In an increasingly polarized society where politicians, media, and social platforms use aggressive communication. And in a world where different voices often clash, we choose to embrace empathy.

In embracing empathy, we are committed to welcoming diverse perspectives. Just as we curate niche designers and unique styles, we aim to embrace the richness of differing opinions.

For 2024, we aim to cultivate open-mindedness and value diverse viewpoints. Specifically, we encourage embracing conflicting thoughts as a way to foster growth and understanding in all its forms. Indeed, this approach resonates deeply with our boutique’s ethos.

Also, let’s stay devoted to sharing ideas, thoughts, and inspirations to help make the world a better place. Our journey of discovery and growth thrives on mutual inspiration. So, when a story captures your heart, share it. It can inspire others. In fact, we all have a role in shaping our culture. And we each contribute to this collective effort! The world deserves a deeper, more thoughtful approach, and a collective culture can help facilitate positive change.

Indeed, sharing is at the heart of our mission. We are not just about selling clothes. We are about creating a community that values thoughtful expression and connection.

So, thank you for being part of our boutique’s story. Undoubtedly, every purchase allows suite123 to exist. Also, every interaction and every shared story contributes to our collective effort in shaping a more empathetic and sharing world.
Together, we are redefining the fashion landscape.

To each and every one of you, we are sending a heap of positivity for 2024! May this year be filled with creativity, joy, and all the wonderful things that resonate with your heart. And may your unique style reflect your values.

Stay connected, stay engaged, and let’s make this year remarkable, together!

Happy 2024 from the suite123 family! 🎉✨

Lots of love,
Ro, Cri and Thami
❤️

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Ethical Choices

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From Fashion to Lifestyle: Do You Take Them into Account?

“Ethical choices shouldn’t be left to us! Ethics shouldn’t fall on us!” Remarked a friend when he felt obliged to purchase products at a low price to stay within the family budget. We know that if the price is too low, someone pays. Usually, the cost falls on people and the planet: see modern-day slavery, pollution and climate change.

The low-price pattern applies not only to the fashion system but to any industry. When we look at ourselves in the mirror, we want to feel good about our choices and their impact on the world. Of course, it’s unfair to put the burden of ethical choices solely on consumers.

However, brands, corporations, and governments ignore the matter. Well, they say they care, and talk about ethical fashion. Also, they support workers. But they do not do the one thing that would allow people a decent lifestyle: paying proper wages. Why? Because enslaving people through the manufacturing chains maximizes profits, which is the only thing that counts for them.

On the hunt for low prices

So, forget ethics for brands and corporations. The ethical choice is up to the end consumers. We can divide them into two groups:
The biggest group are workers who struggle to make ends meet. Although some care about ethics, they cannot afford better choices. So they feel forced to purchase products coming from unfair conditions.
In a smaller group, we find rich people who are happy to close their eyes in the face of ethics, modern-day slavery or climate change. Actually, they don’t care! Exploiting people is okay with their worldview as long as they can keep purchasing cheap products.
What’s your counterargument? Are ethical products too expensive? People from the second group label products of a certain cost as unethical. We’ve heard this plenty of times! But they consider okay cheap stuff made by slaves. Weird reasoning! Isn’t it?

Solutions to ethical choices

Solutions such as government regulations and corporate social responsibility are essential. In fact, the burden of ethical choices must shift from consumers to governments and corporations. They must hold themselves accountable as they are in charge of the economy.

Downward price logic is the expression of a rotten society which exploits people and the planet. But in this race to the bottom, how many slaves does the economy need in the future? And do they have a planet B?

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Selecting fashion for connoisseurs

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How to navigate the fashion weeks

In a finite world of endless options, most of which have a massified concept, selecting fashion for connoisseurs represents very specific research. Less but better, timeless fashion and quiet luxury are fundamental values for people like us.

By the way, given that overproduction ignores the current dramatic situation, we find it thoughtless to focus on brands that still operate on such a pattern.

So, we are keeping an eye on some international brands, and of course, we are curious to see what happens around us in the fashion field. But that’s just what it is – curiosity. In order to survive all the fluff that overwhelms the industry and contributes to making it less fascinating, we need to be very clear.

Fashion selection

Our preferences and choices reflect our values. We know what we need and what we don’t. So, let’s recap what it is precisely.

First, what we don’t need:

  • obsessive trends
  • poor design
  • mass products, quantity, overproduction/ overconsumption
  • fake sustainable products
  • exhausting social media presence

Too much noise and confusion. There’s too much of everything put out in a compulsive manner. That is not for people like us.

Now, what do we want?

  • clothes made to last: staples and meaningful garments. Once you consciously purchase, they will become a constant element of your wardrobe. That’s what timeless fashion means
  • tailoring: well-crafted clothes made with care and attention
  • beautiful fabrics: when you touch and wear them, you feel the difference on your skin
  • good design and quality

The market is large, crowded and oversaturated with pointless stuff. Should we fit in? No, thanks. Brands’ social media presence doesn’t impress us. Influencers don’t influence us. We prefer less, much less, but better. Niche fashion. It might not be for you, which is fine.

Selecting fashion for connoisseurs, people like us, we want unique clothes for unique people.

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UN against overconsumption

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Fashion marketers as the key to a new narrative

The UN says fashion needs to stop promoting overconsumption. Indeed, we are perfectly aligned since we focused more on this evolved path, about four years ago. Though a selection of pieces to wear for a lifetime has always been part of our viewpoint.
Specifically, the UN Environment Programme and UN climate change have just released new recommendations for those who work in fashion marketing and communication.

“We are draining humanity’s lifeblood through vampiric overconsumption and unsustainable use, and evaporating it through global heating,” said U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. (source)

UN against overconsumption: a systemic issue

According to the UN, mass consumption is a systemic issue. So, they identify marketing as the key to fostering cultural change. That is how: leading consumers to change consumption rates, increasing consumer knowledge and shifting consumer behaviours. The idea is to tackle misinformation and greenwashing through science-based communication and transparency.

Although we agree with the idea of fighting overconsumption and overproduction, we are afraid that many of the words suggested in the playbook are buzzwords hiding greenwashing.
Marketing is an ensemble of activities finalised to sell products or services. So far, fashion marketing has contributed to creating confusion through deliberate operations. It isn’t likely that corporations are ready to leave behind their growth pattern. Ethics over money sounds weird from a capitalistic view.

Fashion industry: overproduction & overconsumption

Overproduction and overconsumption are two faces of the same coin, capitalism. In other words, a vicious and exploitative economic system which triggers toxic behaviours.

Overproduction leads to overconsumption: this point was clear to us. So, as a fashion retailer, about four years ago, we thought it made sense to reduce the quantity of clothing we ordered each season dramatically. That allowed us to avoid overstock and end-of-season sales while promoting a reduction of consumption based on fewer products but good quality. And so, a timeless selection of non-trend-based garments with great design value.
Also, getting familiar with the concept of degrowth as an effective strategy to drive change, we trust our choice was valuable.

However, it’s not enough, and we need to do more. But it’s complicated to work since most fashion industry players still promote growth, perhaps hiding it behind traceability QR Codes. Now they call it green growth. Which, as clearly explained in Kevin Anderson’s video, is meaningless. It leads nowhere.

Furthermore, it’s hard to find solutions when consumers shop from retailers who still work on an overproduction basis. How can these retailers stop promoting overconsumption with shops full to the brim of clothes?

Most importantly, does the UN leave the fight against overconsumption to the good heart of marketers? Of course, fashion marketing is part of the problem. And an ethical approach could work. But expecting redemption without regulations and strict controls in a rotten system seems a bit naive.

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Life is about change

Someone told us: “you’ve changed.” We were a bit surprised about that feedback since the tone of voice was like, changing is something wrong.
So, we wonder, is it possible to stay the same? always that identical you? Does this possibility exist for real?
Life itself is a journey, a process. And when you go through a process, you change. Not to mention what it means to go through a pandemic.
So yes, we’ve changed and we will keep on changing, growing, evolving. That’s life!
And we see other people feel the same, so we are here to connect with them. With you. Because, you know, life is about change.

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