Ketevanna

Ketevanna

Making fashion kind

words and photography provided by Anna Megrelishvili

While growing up in Tbilisi, Georgia, Anna used to watch her mum Ketevan create beautiful garment pieces for her friends, family and neighbours. In those days, limited clothing options meant that clothes especially for women were boring and uninspiring. Ketevan wanted to change that so she bought more exciting fabrics from the black market and designed new pieces for her friends. It was her way of empowering them and giving them confidence.

Moving to London over ten years ago, Anna’s passion for designing and creating clothes got absorbed by London’s captivating lifestyle. Only when she decided that she was going to design her own wedding dress, she reconnected with her roots and working with her mum created a completely new design. After this wonderful working experience, Anna started creating more pieces with Ketevan which has led them onto founding KETEVANNA, a new independent fashion label to empower and inspire women, showing them that sustainable and ethical clothing doesn't have to be a compromise and that fashion can be kind to people and the planet!

In the following pages, Anna tells us more about her vision and mission for KETEVANNA.

When I was thinking about starting KETEVANNA, I was frustrated with the lack of options on the market for women like me - women who want to shop sustainable and ethical fashion but don't want to compromise on expressing themselves through clothes. I found most brands were offering bland and boring items which didn't fit my personality.

To me, it's not sustainable having to make compromises between values and wanting to express yourself through the clothes you wear. I believe that monochrome colours and capsule wardrobes are not the way of convincing people to wear sustainable clothes. I wondered if another model could solve this problem. What if we put our planet and community at the centre of everything we do while offering wardrobe items that can be fun and self-expressive too? KETEVANNA was born from this idea.

DESIGNING COLLECTIONS FROM DEADSTOCK FABRICS AND RECYCLED MATERIALS

Our collections are made from deadstock fabrics so even though I get inspiration from almost everywhere - architecture, nature, art, social events, people - the final design inspiration comes from the fabric itself. The process is therefore slightly different to traditional fashion design. From the onset, we set out to be a responsible fashion brand and so we source sustainable fabrics first and then work with them. Even though this can present itself with more challenges, we don't have the luxury of a lot of choices, as you have to work what you find and what is in front of you, it pushes me creatively. To me, it’s almost like the fabric communicates to me with its feel and drape.

What keeps me coming back to deadstock fabric, in particular, is knowing that by rescuing textile waste and upcycling end of roll materials, we reduce the carbon footprint of each garment by around 30%, according to estimates provided by Carbon Trust. Aside from minimising the volume of waste and GHG emissions, we are able to reduce the need for production using new or raw materials which means a reduction in air pollution, water pollution and conservation of resources.

While working on our latest collection, we have introduced innovative regenerative and recycled materials, which is very exciting. This will bring us closer to our goal of making our clothes fully biodegradable or fully recyclable.

By rescuing textile waste and upcycling end of roll materials, we reduce the carbon footprint of each garment by around 30%.

OUR MISSION AND VISION

It is our mission to create high quality fashion not only beyond seasons and changing trends, but more importantly make a positive change through our 4-dimensional sustainable development plan, which includes environmental, social, cultural and financial aspects of running an independent fashion brand like KETEVANNA.

We care deeply about the makers and our aim is to empower them by creating an environment where they learn new skills and feel valued, and by providing them with fair living income and economic empowerment so they feel proud and fulfil their potential in their personal and work life. Our goal for 2025 is to help 300 people into work and give them the professional skills and opportunities they need to progress in the future. We are fully committed to creating and running a fully traceable and transparent supply chain.

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Website: ketevannaofficial.com

IG: @ketevanna_official