Why we left fast fashion and started building a cooperative in North Africa.

A few years ago, my mom and I--seeing how “sustainability” was being turned into another buzzword often used to sell more products, not to challenge the system that made fashion exploitative in the first place--started what eventually became a small cooperative in Tunisia, where every artisan shares in profits and decisions. We work slowly, mostly with wool, cotton, and leather, all hand processed, plant-dyed, and handwoven by women and artisans who’ve inherited these crafts for generations.

We knew rejecting mass production wasn’t an easy choice because it means rejecting convenience, predictability, and scale. But it also meant rejecting the commodification of humanity when people are reduced from ensouled beings to producers and consumers, and when communities, crafts, and even nature are completely stripped of meaning.

I’ve been too often disappointed by a really narrow view of ethics in fashion. It is not just about fair wages and natural materials (though that matters deeply).

It’s also spiritual and political, recognizing the sacredness of labor, the dignity of those who create, and the interconnection between decolonial and environmental struggles worldwide.

We often joke that we’re “accidental entrepreneurs.” We were more interested in politics and activism than in start-up culture. But after watching traditional crafts fade, seeing local communities degraded, and women forced into exploitative factory work, we realized: if we don’t build an alternative, someone else will keep exploiting the system. So we built one slowly but intentionally.

We don’t always get it right. Working cooperatively requires a lot of patience, vulnerability, and unlearning habits from the global capitalist model. But it’s also been one of the most beautiful experiences we’ve ever had, to see artisans fully own their craft, to see work become a form of prayer, and to learn about all of the incredible secrets of the natural world from raw sheep’s wool to natural dyes.

I wanted to share our story here because this community has always been one of the few online spaces where real discussions about ethics in fashion still happen beyond marketing.

I’d love to hear your thoughts:

Have any of you been involved in or supported cooperative models in fashion? and how do you personally navigate the tension between sustainability and accessibility in terms of price?

Submitted November 07, 2025 at 06:33AM by tuniqofficial https://ift.tt/qGQcjRD