Fast Fashion Goes To Die in the World’s Largest Fog Desert. The Scale Is Breathtaking.

Some of the developed world’s favorite brands lie in discarded heaps in Chile’s Atacama desert. How they got there tells the story of modern fast fashion.

The Atacama Desert in northern Chile stretches from the Pacific to the Andes across a vast expanse of dramatic red-orange rock canyons and peaks. It is the driest desert on Earth—and so closely resembles the surface of Mars that NASA tested planetary rovers there.

Today, the Atacama has attained a less wondrous distinction: as one of the world’s fast-growing dumps of discarded clothes, thanks to the rapid mass production of stylish, inexpensive clothes known as fast fashion. The phenomenon has created so much waste, the United Nations terms it “an environmental and social emergency” for the planet. The challenge ahead is turning off that tap.