A new term is starting to pop up in fashion circles, digital product passports, or DPPs for short, and they could be a core solution to shopping more sustainably. You may have spied them on luxury label Chloé, knitwear brand Sheep Inc and now high street store Nobody’s Child has made them more mainstream by incorporating them into its spring collection. But what actually are they and how do they impact fashion’s sustainability?
Despite sounding like an actual passport, your new top won’t come complete with a little ID book. Instead, DPPs appear on clothing care labels as QR codes or scannable chips that can be accessed through the camera on your phone. Through these DPPs, you can “track every stage of the garment production process, from fabric to factory and so much more,” says Jody Plows, CEO at Nobody’s Child, meaning you will be able to see exactly where your clothes came from, what they’re actually made from, and water and carbon usage as well. “Increasingly, customers want to understand where their clothes come from and our DPP pilot allows us to do this, right down to where the very last button was stitched on,” Plows adds, emphasising the lack of information current clothing care labels actually provide.
