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1. Read the text. Then answer the questions on the following page.

The Rise of Fast Fashion taken from Wikipedia

Before the 1800s, clothes-making was a laborious, time-consuming process that required sourcing
materials like wool, cotton, or leather, treating and preparing the materials by hand, then weaving or
fashioning them into functional garments, also by hand. However, the Industrial Revolution forever
changed the world of fashion by introducing new technology like the sewing machine and textile
machines, which led to ready-made clothes and mass-production factories.

As a result, clothes became cheaper, easier, and quicker to make. Localised dressmaking businesses
emerged, catering to the middle classes, and employing workroom employees along with garment
workers, who worked from home for meagre wages. During World War II, the trend for more
functional styles and fabric restrictions led to the standardized production of clothes. Once the
middle-class consumers grew accustomed to it, they became increasingly receptive to the idea of
mass-produced clothing.

The fashion industry produced and ran clothes for four seasons a year until the mid-twentieth century,
with designers working many months in advance to predict what the customers would want. In the
1960s and 1970s, this method changed drastically as the younger generations started to create new
trends. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, fast fashion became a booming industry with people
enthusiastically partaking in consumerism. Retailers such as Zara, H&M, Topshop, and Primark took
over high street fashion by examining and replicating the looks and design elements from runway
shows and top fashion houses and quickly reproducing them, but at a fraction of the cost.

Amancio Ortega, founder of Zara, started his clothing company in Galicia and it featured products that
were affordable replications of popular higher-end clothing fashions in addition to producing its own
unique designs. He opened his first retail outlet in Europe in order to sell his collections in the short
run and also to integrate production and distribution in the long run. He moved to New York in the
early 1990s where the New York Times first coined the term “fast fashion” to describe the mission of
his store, which said that “it would only take 15 days for a garment to go from a designer's brain to
being sold on the racks”.

One of the reasons for Zara's success was that it built a supply chain and production network where
they maintained complicated and capital-intensive operations (like computer-guided fabric cutting)
in-house, while it outsourced labour-intensive operations (like garment sewing) to a network of local
subcontractors and seamstress operatives based in Galicia, Spain.

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Thus, with shorter lead times the company was able to respond very quickly when the sale of their
products exceeded their expectations and also cut off production for items that didn't have very high
demands. They create a sense of urgency for consumers to purchase clothing because they are
constantly changing their layout and stock, so it may not be in store the next time they visit. Unlike
many fashion companies, Zara hardly invests in television or press promotional campaigns and instead
relies on store windows to convey the brand image, the spread of word-of-mouth and locating their
shops strategically in areas with high consumer traffic.

1.A. Describe three developments which, according to the article, transformed the

clothing industry before 1980. (___/6)

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1.B. How did Zara influence the clothing industry? (___/6)

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1.C. What is your opinion of fast fashion? (___/6)

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2. Below are three opinions related to work. Choose one and write your personal
evaluation of the opinion, offering support or counterarguments as 

appropriate. (___/24)

Opinion 1: If you choose a career you love, you’ll never work a day in your life.

Opinion 2: Work / life balance is improving for everyone.

Opinion 3: Being freelance is far better than working for a corporation.

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3. Native speakers of English sometimes say one thing but mean another. Below are
six comments that could have a coded or hidden message. Choose three, and
interpret their meaning. (___/12)

a. You ask someone what the weather is like and he says ‘‘Not too bad’.

b. You accidentally break a glass and your host says ‘Honestly, it doesn’t matter’.

c. You’ve just arrived home from a beach day and she says‘You’ve caught the sun’.

d. You give him your opinion and he says ‘That’s one way of looking at it’.

e. You mention that you’re going out and she says ‘I might join you later’.

f. You make a suggestion and he says ‘I’ll bear that in mind’.

Circle your 1st choice: a b c d e f

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Circle your 2nd choice: a b c d e f

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Circle your 3rd choice: a b c d e f

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4. Below is a draft email written by one of your company interns. On reading it you
find that the draft is confusing, too informal (this email will also go to company
directors), contains irrelevancies and is poorly punctuated. Revise the email to
make it more formal and coherent. (___/18)

Subject: Company changes

Hi everyone

As you know there are some big changes coming in the company and I’m writing to
you to remind you of them in case you’re forgotten which I know some of you will!
First of all the company changes its name today so you have to change all your email
signatures. Not your name of course that won’t change (unless some of you ladies
got married recently) but the company name and your email address but that’s not
all, from Monday we’ll all be agile working and that doesn’t mean working while
standing on one leg it means we’ll be more flexible in working from home flexible
hours that kind of thing. And while we’re in the office we’ll be hot-desking, which
means nobody will have their own desk. So if you have any private or personal
things in your drawers (and Carol yes we all know where you keep the cake!) they
have to go. Any food can be put on my desk of course. But also stuff like family
photos will have to go.

So have a good weekend peeps and see you Monday.

Cheers

Baz

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Write your amended email below.

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5. Choose one of the following tasks: (___/24)

Task 1: Use your imagination and creativity to complete a story. The first sentence of

the story should be ‘Looking down the street, she saw the car. Same colour, same plates.’
Task 2: Write a review of any film, book or song you choose. Your review should be

informative and entertaining.

Task 3: Write about an event or place you went to but didn’t like. You should be honest

but respectful.

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