growing a minimalist wardrobe: sleepwear.

$300 for a piece of fabric to sleep in at bedtime? This is utterly ridiculous.

I find it so mind-boggling that you can cry for affordable health care for Americans, but turn around and market sleepwear that is highly overpriced. If that isn’t the definition of privilege, I don’t know what is.

I disagree with this post, but that’s my opinion. I do love coming to this space and admiring your other work.

I definitely can’t afford $300 for a nightgown, but I hope the people who can, choose some of these brands that you’ve so carefully selected for their ethical practices! Your site is pretty much the only one I’d come to for these sorts of recommendations. Until everyone has a living wage and access to healthcare, ethical shopping is something. Unfortunately where I live it’s never warm enough for warm-weather pajamas, so I’ll be over here in my thrifted knit shirts and flannel pajama pants (dreaming of a matching set someday)!

P.S., Thank you for including a Canadian line (I’m in BC, and love ordering without extra shipping concerns.)

Thank you so much for the recommendations! I’ve been looking to buy myself a summer and winter pajama set and get rid of all the lounge-wear in my drawers that I gravitate to but don’t actually love sleeping in.

Erin, can I ask why you’ve described one of these brands as being “handmade”, and have also used the word to refer to more expensive clothing in one of your replies to a comment above? All clothing is handmade – even the mass-produced fast fashion stuff has to have every seam run through a sewing machine by human hands. It doesn’t really make sense to use the word ‘handmade’ to imply ‘more ethical’ (at least in the case of clothing), because it’s ALL handmade.

For the people (like me) who can’t afford the options listed here, a simple nightie (nightgown) is one of the easiest things to sew yourself. Or keep repurposing your old clothes, or your partner’s, no shame in that! The New Internationalist magazine’s online shop sometimes has reasonably priced (but not extra-cheap) organic cotton, fair trade sleepwear. UK/Japanese fair trade co People Tree sometimes has good sales. For mainstream brands you can check them out on rankabrand.org to see which are the most sustainable/least unsustainable.

I’ve read all the responses above, but still, paying “$300 for a piece of fabric to sleep in” is more than I can wrap my head around.

Thank you so much for the mention Erin!

My name is Alexandra and I am the founder of The Sleep Shirt. I wanted to address some of the pricing concerns mentioned in the comments, in hopes of explaining our point of view and adding another point of view to this complex debate.

First of all, I think it is unfair to use the word overpriced to describe our sleepwear because I can assure you our items are not overpriced. Knowing how manufacturing works, I am pretty sure the other brands’ products aren’t either (unless they own their own factories.) They are expensive, yes, in fact some of our pieces are VERY expensive, but overpriced implies that we are pricing them higher than what a normal and fair margin would dictate. We certainly don’t do that. In fact, our margins are considered low by industry standards, but for obvious reasons, we don’t want to raise our prices just so we take home more money.

Most luxury brands don’t make crazy money off their clothes, the “overpriced” pieces are things like accessories and fragrance which have much higher margins. Of course some are probably raking it in, but generally smaller or independent luxury or premium brands don’t make huge profits until they branch out into accessories or lower priced lines.

Also, I should point out that the repeat of the $300 price point is also unfair. Hardly any of the brands mentioned on this list have items over $300, and at The Sleep Shirt, items priced $300 and over represent less than 5% of our collection. I am not saying our stuff is affordable, but $300 is much, much higher than our average price point.

“I feel a little put out when fairly paid garment workers still can’t afford the products they sew” – this was a very interesting comment. In the case of our products, it’s unlikely that the garment workers can afford to buy loads of our $300 nightshirts, but there is no reason that someone who gets paid above the minimum wage, like our garment workers do, can’t save up and buy a $150 nightshirt and wear it every day for five years and then buy a replacement. Our products are made in a country where the minimum wage is a living wage and while spending several hundred dollars on sleepwear might seem steep to that person, someone who wants to buy nice things and is willing to sacrifice quantity for quality, could theoretically afford it if they were willing to save. Most people don’t do that for a pair of pyjamas but it is not hugely different to saving up for a bag or a pair of shoes you use every day.

But I am realistic and I know that this is not the norm. In order to make a product ethically, with good materials and in a country whose working conditions are humane, you need to charge a decent amount for your product, or you need to exclusively sell direct to your consumer (and hardly ever put it on sale) or you need to produce in large quantities. Or a combination of the above (which is how Everlane manages to keep prices reasonable.) The sad thing is, most people aren’t paid living wages and in countries like the US, where you guys pay little tax but pay so much money for healthcare and other essentials, it’s even harder to be able to afford luxuries.

We would love to make our products more accessible and comparable to fast fashion retailer prices, but the only way to do that (significantly) is to move our production to Bangladesh or Vietnam, and that is not something we are willing to do. This is a blog about sustainable and purposeful living, and the products under that banner are often more expensive than the stuff we buy at Walmart. You can’t have your cake and eat it – if people want things to be manufactured locally and the workers to be paid fairly, they need to be prepared to pay a lot more for it. That’s not an option for everyone, but it is the reality of how production and pricing works.

To the person who said “but still, paying “$300 for a piece of fabric to sleep in” is more than I can wrap my head around.”- I want to say that our sleepwear is more than just a piece of fabric. It’s an expensive piece of fabric, made in Japan on high quality weaving machines, and then shipped to Canada to be made into a garment by people who are paid above minimum wage. That “piece of fabric” will last years. Up until last year I only had 2 nightshirts on rotation at home (plus a nightie but it never gets hot here so I only wear it 1-2 weeks a year.) One of them I have had for five years and it is still in excellent condition. It has at least another 3 years of wear in it, if it is on rotation with another shirt. So while you might be paying $250 for a nightshirt, if you wear it half the year for six years, you are paying $0.23 a wear. That’s probably better value than an $80 blouse or a $150 dress. I know that it is still a high price tag, but there’s value behind it. It is definitely more than jut a piece of fabric.

Lastly, to those who don’t believe in spending money on things to sleep in – that’s your choice. Different people spend their money different ways. But a lot of us value our sleep and are willing to spend a bit of money to make it feel good. That includes a good mattress, nice sheets, and comfortable sleepwear, all made from natural fabrics. I didn’t spend money on sleepwear until I discovered a vintage nightshirt that inspired me to start this company. And now I am hooked, because I wear my sleepwear eight hours a day (and longer on the weekends) and it’s something I think is worth spending money on, if your lifestyle allows it.

Thanks again Erin for including us on this great list of brands and thanks to everyone else for this interesting debate.