Lessmagazine #3

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foreword We proudly present to you issue 03 of Less Magazine. As a natural follower of our Youth Fashion Summit special edition the theme of this issue is Transparency. As in honesty. As in integrity. As in taking responsibility and stand by one’s actions. As in not leaving out relevant information. And as in the literal sense of the word as a material you can actually see through.

During the last couple of months working with this theme, we have also done some self reflection; some people have expressed a lack of understanding towards the brands we have been working with and how they fit into the slow clothing concept. Because of this we are now launching our very own slow clothing manifesto in order to become more transparent. It will be on one of the first pages in every single publication and we will mark all brands or garments featured in the magazine according to category. We hope this will help guide you through our selection of clothes and brands.

Visually we will take you through stories exploring masculinity, the invisible lines of life and time now exposed on the skin as black lines and how time and our conception of reality subconsciously influence how we perceive our surroundings.

In this issue we have seen things through our critical glasses. We have dug into concepts, asked people questions it seemed they would rather be without and received refreshingly honest answers. We also feature concepts we admire and highly approve of. We support people who walk at the forefront of the slow-inspired and transparent wave in our fashion industry and the collaborations and initiatives that help designers to be more aware of their production and make it easier to do things right. As always we obviously try to bring to you designers with great talent, a clear vision, magnificent materials and extraordinary handcraft.

This time we have also gone beyond the borders of our home, Scandinavia, but inevitably we had the Nordic esthetic with us all the way. This issue have brought us from Paris to Berlin, from showroom to studio and have opened our eyes to hand crafted treasures from England and Latvia.

We hope you will enjoy, be inspired and maybe even build new knowledge from this issue. Be critical and make up your own mind. Be transparent. // Martin Mitchell & Pernille Mosbech

contributors Editors-in-chief: Martin Mitchell & Pernille Mosbech Contributers: Myrto Papaliou Andrea Kamper Lasse Lindegaard Pedersen Devin Hentz Pernille Krüger Phillip Monge Malthe S. Rye Thomsen Stephen Burrell Pernille Hammershøj Daniela Reiner Malou BumBum Lisbeth Saalmink Charlotte Ea Joergensen Victor Jones Phillip Koll Georgina Terragni Roxanne Lærkesen Alfred Bramsen Aldemar Amarillo Oscar Schmitto Proofread: Anna De Laurenzio Graphic Design: Vanessa Hoffmann

Cover by Victor Jones

Content Slow Clothing - According to Less Magazine

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Statements on... Transparency

Masculinity

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When Green Becomes the New Black SALES

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Visualization: Lisbeth Saalmink

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Interview: Bricpro

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The conscious consumer (not a guide)

The structural element

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Background: Honest by

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Interview: Richard SĂśderberg & Obscur

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Moments & memories by Mr. Monge: Consumers’ social relations Visualization: Malou Bum Bum

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Interview: Tigran Avetisyan

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The Fabric Source & Trine Wackerhausen

Visualization: Daniela Reiner

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SLOW CLOTHING According to Less Magazine

Less Magazine focus on Slow Clothing, as you probably know. But you might not know exactly what we mean when we say this. So, in order to become more transparent we made a definition, so you can have a clearer idea of what you see on the following pages. The fashion industry itself is not very transparent at this moment. We are doing the best we can, but we can only be as transparent as the brands let us.

At Less Magazine we define slow clothing as a specific approach to clothing consumption mainly from the consumer point of view. Because of this brand can be acceptable in the slow clothing sense without awareness of it and without branding itself as such.

An single garment can also be acceptable while the brand is not.

At Less Magazine we expect a slow clothing garment to be of very high quality in both materials and handicraft. This assures that the garment will last a long time and a lot of use.

Furthermore the garment should fulfill at least one of the following standards to be accepted as slow clothing: The garment should have

• Special features that makes it long-lasting eg. a timeless fit and color • Special meaning that makes it more than just clothes to the owner.

This could be in the form of sentimental value, or a special artistic or conceptual idea behind the design.

• Be made of reused material or other eco-friendly materials

• Be made using techniques that consider the environment

For a brand to be accepted as a slow clothing brand it needs to ignore seasonal trends and at least meet one of the following standards: The company should

• Only make garments that live up to our definition of a slow clothing gar ment

• Work on maintaining or developing new sustainable materials or tech niques

• Present a high level of transparency towards the consumers

To the best of our ability we will mark every garment in one of these ways: G slow clothing garment from a non-slow clothing brand or B a slow clothing garment from a slow clothing brand.

This Slow Clothing definition will be reviewed biannually.

S ta tements on.. . Transparency

WIT H

N I CH L AS H A SSING C o -Fo un de r B RICp ro .co m

“ Good working conditions is the new black – the brands simply can’t afford not to address this issue – the end-user demands it! ”

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S ta tements o n.. . Transp arency

WIT H

E LSE S K JOLD

C a n d. m a g. in M o d ern Cu ltu re and Cul tur al Communi cati on

“ Transparency in fashion is not only about production. It is also about consumption. At this point I see many joint forces working towards a better labeling of clothes on the production side, and this is clearly positive. The next huge challenge is to turn sustainability issues 180 degrees towards us as consumers, in order to make us aware that we are all part of the problem. We need to make the drivers responsible for our overconsumption more transparent, in order to build new ones that can make us buy less and better. Not only better for the environment and garment workers, but better for ourselves.�

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S ta tements o n.. . Transp arency

W IT H

T I GRAN AVE TIS YAN Fashion Designer at Tigran Avetisyan

“- I don’t want to be someone else. If you stay true to yourself, I think you will achieve good results in your work. That you are not pretending to be another person or another designer than you actually are. It’s about transparency –about showing who you are at any given time and not being embarrassed about it. What you see is what you get.”

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MASCULINITY What is masculinity? Does your idea about it stem from yourself or is it in fact what the media or society have inflicted on you?

In this story we look at the transparency or the lack of it that surrounds the picture of masculinity in the public. We look at how clothes and different features can change the appearance of a man and how he is perceived by society. Is a suit more masculine than a leather showpiece wrapped around a naked torso?

And is flowers really for women only?

Art Directors Martin Mitchell & Oscar Schmitto Photographer Victor Jones Make-up Iram Ali Models Jean, Heartbreak Managament & Oskar, Le Management Assistant Silja Bjรถrk 9

Oskar - Vest and trousers by Barbara I Gongini, B Shoes by The Last Conspiracy B Jean - Vest and trousers by Barbara I Gongini B

T-shirt by Barbara I Gongini B Leather coat by Leon Louis B Trousers by Barbara I Gongini B Shoes by The Last Conspiracy B

All by Orphan Bird B

Top: All by Orphan Bird B Bottom: Oskar - all clothes by Orphan Bird B shoes by Elina Dobele B

Showpiece by Barbara I Gongini B

Jean - All clothes by Barbara I Gongini B shoes by Elina Dobele B Oskar - All clothes by Barbara I Gongini B

Leggings by Oscar Schmitto, B t-shirt by Barbara I Gongini B

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Top by Mai-Gidah B Leggins by Oscar Schmitto B

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Shirt by Mai-Gidah B Trousers by Orphan Bird B Shoes by Elina Dobele B

Jumper by Mai-Gidah B Shirt by Mai-Gidah B

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Oskar - All clothes by Barbara I Gongini, B Shoes by The Last Conspiracy B Jean - All clothes by Barbara I Gongini, B Shoes by Elina Dobele B

When GREEN becomes the new BLACK

by Lasse Lindegaard Illustrations by Roxanne Lærkesen Fashion Summits, corporate »Codes of Conduct« and the Higg Index – yes, green is indeed the new black in the fashion world. But is the green transition real or merely a PR stunt? How optimistic should we be that the green trend will last for more than a season?

The problem with the word »sustainability« is identical to that of »innovation«: Everybody wants it, everybody claims it, but only a few have any idea what it actually means. This however, does not keep dozens of actors within the fashion sector from using it in their PR strategies and marketing, and thus we as consumers are overexposed to words like “eco-frendly”, “natural” and “green” this and that. Furthermore, the sustainability programs for most companies are as transparent as the fog over Dhaka in Bangladesh. A regular consumer has no chance of seeing through the complicated supply chain that occurs prior to the purchasing of a pair of jeans: from the cotton field, to the manufacturing, to the shipping and retailing etc. and it seems that most companies are not concerned with clearing this up for us. This lack of transparency and the excessive use of green buzzwords are generating distrust between the fashion companies and the consumers, and is also potentially damaging to those who do run a green business.

Therefore I have conducted my own little research by asking the following questions: What is the status of sustainability in the fashion world? How far have we come to date? Who should take responsibility – the consumers or the companies? And what chance do I, as a consumer, have to navigate this jungle of self-proclaiming green brands?

What’s the status?

It is no secret that a vast majority of the apparel production, especially in Scandinavia, has been moved to countries outside of Europe, such as 26 26

China, India, Bangladesh and Vietnam. Globalisation has changed the game, and the apparel industry has gradually shifted to a fashion industry. A Danish 2011 PhD-study by Kristoffer Jensen concludes that in the 1950’s the industry had to adapt to the contemporary fashion trends to survive, in the 1970’s, international competition first started to become a challenge, and in the 1990’s, increasing international competition waved goodbye to domestic production for good.

This change within the industry is a story of success; the industry managed to evolve and is still (even after the crisis in 2008) going strong.

But there is a downside to this outsourcing, says Birgitte Lesanner, Head of Communications for Greenpeace in Scandinavia. »They [the industry] do it, because it’s cheaper and there is less regulation. In Europe we have legislation which prohibits the worst types of chemicals. But what has happened is that they then just place the production outside of Europe and import it back in. In this way, not only are we continuing to put these toxic chemicals into the global environment, but we are also exporting a gigantic environmental problem to the less-developed countries.« This is obviously damaging the environment, but it is also potentially damaging the industry according to Johan Kryger, Senior Manager at NICE, The Danish Fashion Institute. He explains how outsourcing has meant that the fashion industry missed out on the development of new means of production compared to other industries: »By outsourcing you skipped all the problems. The entire production machinery did not go through the same green transition as many of the other industries did, say the architecture or food industry. Still, looking at the global market, it soon became obvious to The Danish Fashion Institute that sustainability would become an important competitive parameter in the future.«

In Scandinavia many initiatives have emerged over the past decade, such as NICE in Denmark and Mistra Future Fashion in Sweden – the goal of both organizations is to help small and large fashion companies to develop, and to implement sustainabillity strategies. On the larger scale we have SAC (Sustainable Apparel Coalition) – an umbrella organisation with members from the top shelf of the industry such as Nike, Adidas, H&M and Bestseller.

But, wait a minute! Is it a good thing to have these powerful companies sitting around the table discussing solutions to the problems they themselves are part of?

According to Johan Kryger it is: »It has to be a multi-pronged strategy. We can’t implement a green transition overnight and change both our consumer behavior and the way a whole industry works. It’s a process that has to also be economically sustainable for the companies. That said, it must not become a pretext for inaction – we have to push hard to change the industry. But even though it is possible that these super fashion companies like H&M, Inditex etc. will not exist in the future, they are necessary in the transformation of the industry.« OK, so for a profound green transition to ever occur, big companies like these have to be onboard, therefore organisations like SAC are a step in the right direction. Still, recognizing and agreeing on the issues and challenges is one thing – taking action is another. And for everyone who has paid just a little attention to the international COP-meetings, it should be clear that good intentions will only get you halfway – money and commitment will get you there and back. Here the term “greenwashing” comes into play. When companies spend more money on telling you they’re green than on actually being green, that’s greenwashing. This is an issue that has been

addressed within many industries, but it can be hard to detect due to the lack of transparency.

At Greenpeace they are aware of this problem with companies who do nothing, or do just enough to silence the criticism, and they are therefore skeptical towards these allegedly green strategies. Still, a positive tendency is spreading throughout the fashion industry where a growing number of big and small businesses include sustainability programs within their company’s future plans, says Birgitte Lesanner. She agrees with Johan Kryger, that even though the big companies are part of the problem, they are also part of the solution: »It is crucial to have the big companies on board as they are able to pull the rest of the industry in the same direction. In order to raise the bar and develop new technologies we need the big ones«, she says, and mentions the otherwise criticized Conscious collection by H&M as a positive initiative, which forces designers and manufacturers to think innovatively.

Who should take responsibility?

Young western designers and small start-up companies are already pulling in a greener direction, but as we have just learned the big boys have to also commit before a paradigm-shift of how we consume clothing is even close to becoming a reality.

Birgitte Lesanner from Greenpeace believes that small companies can actually make a difference by making sustainability cool, and thus create a higher demand for those types of products.

However, she makes it clear that real change will only come through either government legislation or the companies themselves: »The main responsibility lies with the corporations who make money from producing a certain 27

product. For example the Danish company Bestseller has moved their production to China and other countries and is slopping these chemicals around. I think that is irresponsible and unethical,« she says.

Mogens Werge, Director of Corporate Sustainability & Communication at Bestseller, does not agree that they are the source of the problem nor that they are failing their green responsibility. He does however acknowledge »that there is a risk by doing business in these regions,« since there is no, or very little, regulation on both the environmental and social fronts. According to Mogens Werge these are challenges that Bestseller is well aware of and that is why it has become a major part of the company’s CSR-strategy when doing business in, for example, Bangladesh: »First of all, let’s face it; we are there because it’s cheap, otherwise we could produce our products back in Herning in Denmark. What we have built in Denmark as a society in terms of collective agreements, working conditions etc. throughout the past 100 years in a dialogue and/or a struggle with the unions, is obviously far from the everyday reality of these workers. Therefore, we as a company must take on that responsibility as much as possible. Secondly, it is of course at the same time a way to protect our brand from critique,« Mogens Werge says.

We have now talked about the small and big companies – about legislation and working conditions. But aren’t we forgetting someone here?

That’s right – the not-so-insignificant other half of the equation: the consumers. Our hunger for new things – the shopaholic nature of young modern men and women, who have been taught to love and crave anything bearing a sale tag, are undeniably a big part of this and should, accord-

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ing to Mogens Werge, take a good look at themselves in the fitting room mirror: “The responibillity lies both with the consumer and the company. As a consumer you can have a hard time figuring these things out, but it does not free you from responsibility. Obviously, we shoulder the main responsibility, but as a consumer, you can’t just close your eyes and say “I don’t know what to do.” You have to prepare as a consumer. Just like when you’re buying a car, you want a car that has the best gas mileage – partly because of economical reasons, but also because of the eco-factor«.

The Newspeak of the fast fashion industry As Vanessa Friedmann, fashion director/critic at New York Times, stated on stage during the Copenhagen Fashion Summit a few months back, the contradiction between fast fashion and sustainabillity is obvious. Sustainable fashion is a oxymoron and as ridiculous a concept as healthy fast food. Fast fashion and sustainability simply don’t mix and thus makes the involvement of H&M in SAC echo the same reliability as when Camel had doctors approve their cigarettes back in 1949 (look it up on YouTube for a perfect example of the power of strategic communication).

That comparison might sound a bit too harsh, but consumers should be advised to react with precisely that kind of skepticism when it comes to the green PR surrounding us these days. A good example of this is an article »Fast fashion doesn’t automatically mean unsustainable« published on theguardian.com. As the title indicates, the article is advocating how fast fashion (or “High Street” as they want us to call it) is not as bad as we think, how fashion has become democratic (whatever that means), and how the fast fashion companies actually »are at the forefront whereas many luxury brands remain oblivious« when it comes to sustainability. You know, when

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something sounds a little too good to be true, it usually is.

Well, you guessed it: the author of the article is no other than Catarina Midtby, Head of Fashion and Sustainability Communication, H&M. Even though The Guardian states that the article is published within the media’s so called “Business Partner Zone”, it could definitely have fooled me; the text was structured like a news article and the layout was identical to that of average articles on the site.

Even though one could argue that this probably says more about the commercialization of the classic news media and/or the downfall of journalism in general, it also shows us just how clever the communication strategies of brands like H&M are. They are aware of the difficulty of uniting two contradictory concepts and so, instead of denying the issue, they embrace it and operate within its language. And what a vague language that is. Like the article says: »Today we expect the products we want to be available and affordable. We just need to be smarter, and produce and consume sustainably. [… ] Because we’re all in it together«. Doesn’t that sound good?

Unlike this piece of strategic communication from H&M, Mogens Werge from Bestseller holds no such illusions about a golden connection between sustainability and fashion. He agrees with Friedmann’s logic and accepts the special premise on which the industry is based. »It is completely contradictory and paradoxical to talk about sustainabillity in a business that provides products, which – at the end of the day – are not necessary. Most of us, at least in the Western world, have the clothes that we need.

Therefore, we are talking about a product which in itself is a paradox,« Mogens Werge says. He continues: »That is how the world works. Politi30

cally and ideologically you might not agree with that, but that is the name of the game in terms of fast fashion, and therefore we must operate from that perspective when we as a company wish to reduce the potential negative impact.« Maybe Mogens Werge makes an important point in so far as we need to consider the underlying consumerism on which our economy is based if we wish to change it. In the same way, Johan Kryger from NICE also wants to bring more realism into the discussion of sustainability: »We believe it is necessary that people recognize that there is something called “fashion”, and understand that the consumer will never buy jeans in order to save the world. Fashion is a communicative tool and an important part of creating an identity in a modern society.« So, what have we learned?

If we in Scandinavia and Europe do not invest in green strategies, then someone else will; the green ship is about to sail and we need to be on it if we wish to continue to be the frontrunners of the industry. The corporations bear the main responsibility – but consumers shouldn’t be naive and fool themselves when they buy a dress for 15€ or a suit for 60€. Neither should they be fooled by the industry, but be critical and vigilant, as it is always possible that the supposed ethical and eco-friendly summer dress on display in a fast-fashion store is actually a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

S A L E S

by Stephen Burrell

My wife gave me the usual spiel about Copenhagen being a better place to bring up our young family. Looking back now, I often ask myself: “Why was it not such a big wrench to leave London?� It was obviously down to following my heart, the desire to try something new and having faith in my ability to sell.

Sales has always played an integral part of my life, as my parents are from a fruit farming family. And as a fruit farmer you have to: a) prepare the ground, b) plant the seeds, c) water and nurture them, and finally d) harvest the fruit.

Sales is a profession. Let me repeat that statement: Sales is a profession.

Good salespeople combine anthropology, marketing, pyschology and sales on a daily basis. I have always had a way with words and understood human behavior.

A lot of salespeople, especially within the fashion business, are so anxious to get the sale, that they pitch their products as soon as anyone expresses any kind of interest. Good salespeople start with a line of inquiry about the buyer before they make any sort of presentation. The ability to uncover the issues or challenges the buyer may be facing is priceless. The best method consists of asking and understanding. This will draw the buyer to your product without you doing any direct selling.

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The best salespeople come across as business consultants rather than sellers. It’s not just selling; it’s like peeling an onion and asking good, insightful, searching questions. The truth is that the best sellers can ask good questions, analyze the answers, and identify nuggets within the answers that they can develop and explore further with more follow-up. In other words, let the buyer do the talking and allow the buyer to make up their own mind that they need your product.

The salesperson within the fashion business has a reputation for being superficial. The statement, “He’s just a salesman!” is banded around in a derogatory way, meaning he lacks depth and integrity. No fashion company can survive without sales, in fact no business can survive without sales. So why are salespeople not trusted?

One of the most impressive qualities you can develop as an effective salesperson within the fashion business is the ability to do what you say you will do. The way to attain that quality is quite simple. Say you’ll do only the things you intend to do. If you have no intention of doing something, then keep your mouth shut. When you do what you say you’re going to do, you develop a valuable reputation for effectiveness and dependability. If you find yourself telling buyers only what they want to hear, watch out! You’re setting yourself up for problems. If what you say is based on what people want to hear, rather than what you intend to actually do, sooner or later you’ll find yourself in the difficult position of having to break your word.

Our beliefs are based on our evaluation of something. Now, if we re-evaluate the situation, our belief about that situation will change. Sales knowledge, skills, competencies, and behaviors need to evolve. You can achieve significant sales growth naturally through an unwavering focus on your customers.

Salespeople should be respected. Sales is an art form. Sales is all about persuasion. A good salesperson understands how to hunt and harvest. Sales is not just about order taking, you have to build the fantasy and then turn this fantasy into theory. The message you convey in a sales conversation is 55% body language and nonverbal communication, 38% tone of voice, and only 7% in the words that you use.

Salespeople will dramatically improve sales performance when they: 1. Research the customer’s needs; 2. Ask the customer about their goals; 3. Use this research to ask insightful questions; 4. Listen carefully; 5. Make the customer feel that they are getting advice from an expert who can help them improve their business; 6. Present the product as a way to solve the buyer’s problem.

Sales is a profession. Let me repeat that statement: Sales is a profession.

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Vi sua liza tion

A big part of Less Magazine is to let creative people show their talents.

Visualization is a section divided into three parts as we choose three different stylists or photographers to interpret a theme given by the editors of the magazine visually. In this issue the theme to be interpreted was: Transparency. We hope you enjoy the way the theme has been interpreted.

LISBETH SAALMINK “The conception of reality The embedded observation Where shadows tangles the past and presence Subconsciously surveill our surroundings.�

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Interview

INTERVIEW

BRICPRO

by Myrto Papailiou

Nowadays the eyes of the consumer have turned to the Third World, and their consciousness has unexpectedly increased. Dark stories are suddenly spread around the world, about hundreds of people dying in factory accidents or about abused workers who have started to raise their voice and fight for their human rights. Nobody can clearly say where this sudden need for a better world has come f r o m , b u t i t i s c e r t a i n t h a t o n c e P a n d o r a’s b o x i s opened it cannot be easily closed, and nor should it.

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“Now both the media and the end consumers are putting pressure on all companies to be able to answer questions about where their things are produced and to ensure that they are made under good conditions”, says Signe Mørk Sørensen, the CSR consultant of BRICpro.

BRICpro is a good example of how companies can actually change bad habits and create a healthy and strong business through ethical and transparent production. In a professional little room at CSE (Copenhagen School of Entrepreneurship) I was introduced to the co-founder of BRICpro, Nichlas, his CSR consultant, Signe and one of the company’s clients, Emilie. Nichlas was very talkative and open from the moment we met and I imagine that this approach perfectly represents the transparency of his business. BRICpro was founded in 2011 by Nichlas Hassing and Mads Bisgaard Christensen, and its mission is to help companies in the electronics, furniture and textile industries to collaborate with ethical production places in Brazil, Russia, India and China (in other words, the “BRIC” countries).

“We saw a business market opportunity back then.

The market now is much more interested in what BRICpro has to offer because the end consumers are. Consumers are more interested in how people are treated and they demand that they are treated in accordance with their human rights”, explains Nichlas.

Although this whole concept is very close to that of a sourcing house, BRICpro also has its own CSR department and standards, and as Nichlas says, they have merged the sourcing house logic with an NGO concept. To date they have visited 250 factories in China, of which only 50 managed to meet their CSR criteria. Signe continued by giving us further details on how the company works: “The way we start with all of our clients is to either provide them with a factory contact or take charge of the end to end production. Afterwards, many companies choose to proceed with additional services”.

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Emilie Risgaard, founder of the cashmere brand Ocean & Me, began her collaboration with BRICpro by taking a factory contact, but she ended up with a much more promising business plan.

“When I started up it was from scratch and I had no idea where I could find a place to produce my items.

Then I got in touch with BRIC pro and I thought it would be a great opportunity to get into this business in an easy but safe way”, says Emilie.

However, when Emilie started to incorporate CSR into her business, she saw a great potential to communicate this the right way.

“It is a very interesting CSR story!” Emilie says, “In September we started discussing how we could offer something to the factory that could simultaneously build my brand. What we came up with was a brand identity with high quality cashmere but also with another side to it. So it’s not only a cashmere sweater but it’s also the thought behind it, that the production is good and that you can trust it when you buy it, that the people in the factory are working in good conditions and that we are continuously investing in their social life. For example, we now provide them with yoga mats and learning materials, so they can have a pleasant time at work”.

However, that wasn’t the best part of the story,

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as Signe continued by explaining the reaction of the factory owners: “They never expected a client to give something back to the factory. It was really rare that clients came to inquire about how their workers were actually doing, and how the priority was not only the delivery time and price, but the workers. Seriously, they had tears in their eyes and that was really moving! It was a very positive story”.

It was indeed moving and positive as there was tension in the room while she was talking to us.

Emilie ensured that in the future there would be more investments and she was specifically thinking of providing the workers with a teacher or a doctor. In this way she hopes to create a unique cashmere brand, a fair cashmere brand.

It seems that there is now a whole market interested in people being treated with a certain respect.

“I think there could be more interest, but it’s something which is developing over time. I hear interest from the press, as well as from the retailers”, Emilie says.

Some people say that the market cares because the end consumer cares, and others say that the end consumer cares because the market cares.

This, however, is yet another question with no

definitive answer at this stage. The fact remains that at this point CSR is good business and not just philanthropy, as Signe maintains and this is the reason why the market is starting to embrace ethical behavior. It is even more surprising when the factories want to follow this mindset and improve. On that matter, Nichlas explained how a factory owner called John was a good example of this.

“Every Chinese businessman has an English name and his was John Wayne because he loves John Wayne”, says Nichlas while the rest of us burst out laughing.

According to NIchlas, John Wayne owned a factory in South China, which unfortunately lacked a ventilation system and as a result, there was a very high level of dust throughout the factory.

“Even if we were standing next to each other I wouldn’t be able to see you”, says Nichlas trying to describe the unacceptable situation.

Moreover, the temperature during the summer period was extremely high, around 45 to 50 degrees.

“So what I said to him was that we wouldn’t be able to manufacture at his place, unless he fixed these things”, Nichlas continued.

and his/her family, healthcare, transportation, rent, clothing, education and a small amount for unforeseen incidents. As for child labor, he informed us that the complexity is based on the age limit, which is different in each country and situation. For example, many children accompany their parents to the factories without actually working, as Nichlas explains: “You can’t separate a mother from her child if she needs to take it with her to work”.

Moreover, Signe faces another ethical issue which indicates that many of those children need money and you cannot push them on to the street. However, “if this is the case the best one can do is to ensure that the children will receive a proper education at the same time”, Signe says.

When it comes to CSR there are many thin lines which can be crossed and some issues are more complex than others. Things are even more difficult for a company such as BRICpro, which works within three different industries and countries, and demands different CSR challenges for each case.

“We know it is complex but we have to start somewhere”, says Signe.

Visiting John two years later, Nichlas noticed that he had built a new factory with ventilation systems and all other requirements in place.

Nichlas emphasized the fact that many factories want to improve and be part of BRICpro’s umbrella organization. He explained,

Consequently, BRICpro has some non-negotiable CSR standards as a starting point, but it continuously builds upon them according to each case and each client. For example, one of their goals for this year is to dig deeper into the environmental criteria as Signe informed us,

“We come with larger western clients and we give people a reason to want to be part of us”.

“One of our goals for this year is to further develop the tool we use when we go to a factory in order to evaluate it. This year we will try to include environmental criteria as well. For example, what the factory does with waste and how they manage water and recycling”.

Maybe the new demands of western clients will eventually lead factories to make more thoughtful choices and act more cautiously.

When we talk about CSR we usually have blurred ideas about livable wages, child labor, forced labor, safety conditions, and general conditions regarding the wellbeing of workers. When we talk about wages or child labor in particular, we never know what exactly we’re talking about. According to Nichlas a livable wage in Shanghai is approximately 805 USD and in South China 564 USD, which is enough to provide food for the person

Moreover, Nichlas added that another goal for 2015 is to enter the jewelry industry as he sees a great potential in Brazil. However, as he points out, they have to tread carefully because the jewelry industry hides a whole new set of CSR challenges. In any case, it is an ongoing step by step process, which requires observation and patience.

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“…It’s too broad to start with everything. It always starts with a client who comes and asks for a service. You can’t provide a service before a client comes to ask for it”.

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In other words, once you want to be a problem solver, you deal with what comes along according to the market preferences; and this is a stable way to improvement and success.

SEE THROUGH THE CONSCIOUS CONSUMER (NOT A GUIDE).

by Devin Hentz Photo by Silja Björk.

We are constantly inundated with many messages from several different sources on how we should always be mindful of how we dress. Whether it is a parent imploring you to look more “professional” or pages of a magazine reminding you how much better you could be styled, the way we dress seems to matter. It dictates how others will perceive and respond to you, which alters your life experience. A sense of transparency in fashion will allow for each individual to utilize the power of dress, both as a means of personal expression and as a vital link through which we are connected to other people.

Transparency in fashion means being able to see beyond the suggested face value of a piece of clothing, and to see through to the real ideas, motives, and power that lie within the garment. This sense will also give an insight into how the reasons and means by which we acquire a particular garment have changed drastically over time.

One way to exercise one’s awareness and gain this sense of transparency is to consider who benefi ts, if anyone, from your lifestyle choices, especially in your purchase of clothing. Where is your money going? Who benefi ts in the end? The benefi ts (or lack thereof) could be fi nancial or in the form of social currency. In the fi nancial sense, consider what and who it is you are funding. A young designer? Underpaid minors? A skilled craftsman? An artist?

Dress, as both a private and public extension of ourselves, helps to group us into social categories whether we like it or not. To question the benefactor of our fashion choices in the form of social currency requires an awareness of fashion as an institution of capitalism, as well as its role in the spoken and unspoken dynamics between people. Social currency can be described as information that allows one to communicate with others. It is knowledge one gains so that they may start and sustain interactions with others. An easy way to illustrate this point is through trends and trend forecasting. When a certain color, accessory, textile, pattern, or silhouette becomes the new ‘cool’ thing to wear, people rush to own it. The level of demand of each particular trend depends solely on the culture/subcultures that value it. And there are many culture/subcultures – each with a somewhat uniform that identifi es their affi liation to said group. Each group is simultaneously being marketed to through visual, aural, and tactile means to appeal to their particular tastes and standards. The biggest question here is: Who benefi ts the most? The clothing retailers by providing the people with the look they desire? The designers who have found success designing for a niche audience?

Or us, the benefactors, because we have the look we desire, and through our visual representation, we gain social currency amongst our peers by nonverbally stating what we know and who we are aware of?

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This question of social currency evokes the rumors in fashion history about King Louis XIV of France. He did many things during his reign, including founding the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, and moving court from Paris to Versailles.

He reigned during the Baroque Era, one of the most luxurious and extravagant periods of fashion history in Europe. He was notorious for having extremely high standards for the appearance of his courtiers, and for frequently setting new trends, to which the courtiers had to quickly adapt. It was rumored that the King did this in order to keep his subjects distracted and thus prevent them from plotting against him. This rumor highlights the question of who benefi ts in dress: the King or his subjects?

Another exercise that promotes transparent, conscious shopping is being able to see a material object for what it is – simply a physical object – and separate it from the ideas that people have attached to it. By this I mean: understand that what you are buying is simply a shirt, it is not the “perfect” body that the shirt is photographed on, nor is it the status that the model and setting in the photograph seem to display, it is a shirt, a thing, not an idea. This may sound impossible, especially since objects and ideas seem to be intrinsically bound, and an object is simply an idea objectifi ed. While this is true to a certain degree, the way we perceive objects is buried under many layers of an arbitrary idea, and can be vastly simplifi ed. This can be done very literally: Take a piece of clothing and lay it flat in front of you. Do not consider the brand, where you bought it or how much it cost, but think about its key elements. Does it fi t your body the way that you would like, accentuating or concealing the right parts? Does it serve its purpose as a shield to protect your body, or does it help extend your body’s capabilities? Consider the material from which it is made. Is it luxurious or utilitarian?

Once you are able to strip a garment down to its most essential elements of function and quality, there will be a greater awareness of craftsmanship. It takes this methodical doubt of everything that is not physical about the garment to create a space where the construction of the material is the outstanding feature. Once this point has been reached, you can work backwards to consider the imbedded ideas and symbols that come with each garment. Consider the brand. What is the purpose of this brand or designer? What influences the designer? Consider the context of the clothing. Which types of people wear things like this? When and where? Amongst whom is it popular?

If it references the past, what era? What era from what country? If it is innovative, why?

What new techniques are used, or old techniques reused? What does it imply about the wearer?

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To push the ideal of transparency further, there should be a level of clarity when it comes to how information about fashion is disseminated. Through the internet, even those who have no direct affi liation with the fashion industry have unlimited access to what’s happening in fashion. There are more magazines, designers, and models than ever before, and we can access them in an instant, without having to commit ourselves to the subculture or esthetic that they are promoting. The already innumerable subcultures are breaking down into subcultures of subcultures. Most of us are hyper aware of fashion and style just because we consciously and subconsciously take our cues from those around us, and are witnessing and participating in fashion as it happens. We are both spectators of the game and the players. We are playing at the pace that fashion wants, and in a sense, the pace that we demand. The initial purpose of fashion was to separate the social and economic groups of people, and whilst it still does that, it is now being used as a fi ller for our insatiable esthetic void. It’s natural that we want to consume with our eyes what is beautiful or shocking, and with our skin the innumerable textures available, but with the pace of fashion we are only consuming and not really thinking about or appreciating the experience of our visual moments. If we stopped letting the current dictate our choices, we could gain a more objective view of the fashion industry and the idea of what it means to express oneself through dress. I am suggesting a conscious effort to stay out of the loop, maybe even for a few days at a time, and notice how your pace of action and reaction with regard to style slows down.

It is clear that fashion is deeply personal and private, and that the individual has more power than ever to control the ebb and flow of the ideas that sustain the system.

A sense of transparency will allow us to effectively see through and challenge the current system, and direct fashion’s trajectory on a path that not only nurtures individual expression, but allows for the consideration of its cost and benefi ts on ourselves and those around us.

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THE S T RU CTU RAL E LE ME NT PEOPLE TEND TO KEEP THEIR FEELINGS UNDER THEIR SKIN. IN ART THE LINE REPRESENTS AND EXPRESSES FEELINGS. WHAT HAPPENS IF WE PUT THE MOST IMPORTANT ELEMENT OF ART, THE LINE, ON THE SURFACE OF A HUMAN BODY?

Thanks to Henrik Vibskov Boutique Copenhagen Creative directors Alfred Bramsen & Aldemar Amarillo Photographer Charlotte Ea Joergensen Model Katinka Krogsgaard Svarstad Makeup artist May Simon Assistant Caroline Gudmandsen

Necklace by Bjørg B

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Underwear - Stylist’s own Shirt by Burberry Prorsum B Sandals by Wali Mohammed Barrech B c

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Skirt by Henrik Vibskov B Bra - Stylist’s own

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Hair piece - Stylist’s own

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Left: Sweatshirt by JUUN J G , Underwear and plastic skirt - stylist’s own Right: Earring by Chanel G

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56 Bracelet by Bjørg B

57 Shirt and Bag by Wali Mohammed Barrech B

B a ck ground

B ackgro u nd :

Honest by

by Andrea Kamper

Photo: All right reserved by Honest by© Information is a Luxury The fact that people’s awareness of sustainability and their consciousness of how they are treating the planet has become a kind of status symbol in the past couple of years, is nothing new. There is nothing better to many people, than to dish up an organic chicken rather than a battery hen to ensure that the world can see their awareness of good quality and sustainability. At the same time there is still also room for a broader awareness of the fashion world and the sources of the apparel that customers are buying. Hopefully being aware of your apparel will be just as big a status symbol as eating healthy, sustainable food.

With such binoculars on, I have tried to see how transparent famous fashion companies are on their official websites. A quick visit to Chanel’s official website to see where the clothes have been manufactured or if they had made any progress towards sustainability is not very enlightening. Unfortunately there is no visible information on the origin of the materials or where the clothes were manufactured. Here the focus is more on the long-lasting brand and its stylish designs, and less on tackling the environmental issues. At least that is what you see on their official website. It is unfortunate because it seems as though certain information about the product you are about to buy is concealed. As you usually take it for granted that a certain quality comes with a well-known brand that you are buying, you don’t expect them to be transparent. For instance, other well-established brands, such as Georgio Armani and Ralph Lauren, have already outsourced some of their production to Bangladesh and China, even though you don’t actually derive that information from their websites. When you click on ‘apparel’ on each of their websites the information box to the right of the apparel simply states whether the manufacturing country is Italy or the USA, and if it isn’t then they list the apparel as “imported”. Not that this is false information or the quality is inferior to products manufactured in Italy or the USA, but it is still a shame to see that they choose to omit some information, supposedly hoping to be blessed with the benefit of the doubt from the consumers and have the reputation of the brands remain spotless. This means that if you don’t happen to have one of the afore-mentioned brands in a store near you, you have to make an effort to find the information on the Internet.

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New perspective This is where Honest by comes in: A very relevant luxury fashion company formed in 2012, whose clear philosophy is to be a transparent and environmentally friendly brand that will not leave the customer in the dark about the methods used to produce every garment in the shop. The founder, Bruno Pieters, gained a wealth of experience as a designer before he started his conscious label. He graduated with a BA in Fashion Design in 1999 from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp and then developed his own ready-towear lines for both men and women. His trademarks are sharp cuts and great craftsmanship with an eye for minimalistic constructions. In addition, his shows have attracted a great deal of attention in the fashion world, which in turn has paid off by leading to jobs as Creative Director for the Belgian leather company Delvaux in 2005, and later on as Art Director for Hugo by Hugo Boss in 2007. However, this wasn’t what ultimately inspired him to go further than any fashion brand has yet to accomplish on the informative front.

It was the break from his hasty fashion career in 2010 that made him realize what his priorities in the fashion world should be. Of the two years traveling around the world, India was the main eye-opener to a community with a very present textile industry and impact on the environment. It made him more aware of not exploiting the earth and its resources, and of making the consumer aware of the manufacturing process of the clothing. This eventually inspired him to launch his own approach to that philosophy and as the name of the company truly reveals, it is all about letting the customer know the honest story behind the apparel they are about to buy; “Honest by is the first company in the world to share the full cost breakdown of its products. The word Honest refers to the way in which the honest by online retail store operates, with a 100% transparency policy. The concept behind Honest by offers designers a public platform to share their own design processes; utilizing the extensive research honest by has already conducted on organic fabrics and suppliers”, Bruno Pieters states.

Luxury means no riddles Although still only a web shop, and maybe because of this, his company has taken its own time to go further than many of the other big luxury brands have when it comes to transparency. The price is in the higher end, but in return you get full transparency on the garment you buy; knowledge of the manufacturer and the number of people involved in the whole process. Plus a slick, tailored look and a brand that focus on sustainability.

Take Pieters’ shirt from his web shop as an example: the “BLACK COTTON SHIRT WITH ORGANIC KNIT SLEEVES”, where the description of style, price and size cannot even begin to cut it in terms of the information provided to you. If you wanted to, you could easily get sucked into every little detail about the garment.

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For instance, beneath the pictures of the shirt, there is a material list, which starts with information on the fabric and ends with information on the safety pin that fastens the price tag to the apparel. Here you can learn, among many things, that the knit, which makes the sleeves of the shirt, is made of 100 % GOTS (The Global Organic Textile Standard) certified cotton; the origin of the raw material is from Greece; the spinning company is Schoeller from Austria; and the manufacturer Pentlja P is in Slovenia. This is just the extensive information on the sleeves. The same extensive information goes for the rest of the shirt: the rest of the fabric used is, for instance, 100% cotton, not organic but with an OEKOTEX certificate, which means it contains no traces of pesticides or dyes that could cause allergic reactions, and is therefore skin-friendly.

Furthermore, there is the manufacturing detail category where you can learn about the location of the manufacturing companies, the number of employees and the length and number of pieces of fabric they use to make the apparel. Taking the afore-mentioned manufacturing company, Pentlja P knitting factory in Slovenia (that produces the knitting for the sleeves) as an example, the website states that it has 5 employees, the knitting time is 10 min a piece, and 10 pieces are made to make 10 black cotton shirts. So if you were wondering what the process of knitting involves, there you have it.

Last but not least there are the price calculations on every piece of material used in the creation of the garment (including fabric, size labels, cotton, thread etc.) and all the other chains in the process that make the shirt. These price details go for all materials used to produce the shirt. Then add on the costs of the other materials, development, manufacturing, transportation, branding costs, and finally the wholesale and retail markup that covers wages for employees, office supplies, maintenance of the website and insurance, etc. A lot of middle chains, I know, but this also enables you to count all of the steps leading to the final price of 247.62 Euro (336.88 USD) for the “BLACK COTTON SHIRT WITH ORGANIC KNIT SLEEVES”.

These informative steps ensure that you know the cost of every piece of material in the garment. Furthermore, how much of the money goes to the middle chains and how much the designer profits in the end.

Laying out the whole process to the customer is a smart way to show the value of the apparel and also makes it easier to understand how many steps are involved in making a black cotton shirt with organic knit sleeves and why it is the price it is.

However, according to founder, Pieters, this is simply essential information that every fashion company should display: “If you don’t do it now, you’ll have to adapt when complete transparency becomes mandatory. I think it’s wiser to be a leader who is ahead of the rest rather than lagging behind because, you know, it will become mandatory one day. People who have doubts about this are the same sort of people who once believed women wouldn’t have the

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right to vote and gay people wouldn’t have to right to marry. Buying a mystery will be an absurd concept soon. There’s no luxury in a riddle.”

Outside the ordinary All this talk of transparency doesn’t negate the equally important word, design. Because it is just as important that the clothing is beautiful and wearable. Luckily Pieters’ style is very elegant and well tailored with clean geometric details in subtle colours, which makes it easy to use for everyday wear. Still the smaller details make every piece differ from ordinary basic wear, and gives the apparel a unique look; jersey shirts with cut-outs by the shoulder seam or pencil wrap skirts that have a wrap-around layer on top that gives the sometimes boring pencil skirt a new side. Furthermore, most of the materials used are organic, some styles can even be sorted by categories like, “Vegan”, “Skin friendly”, “Recycled”, and “European” (the latter meaning the product and the materials are all made in Europe), and are carefully sourced to be good quality. It is not only the Bruno Pieters’ designs that are on the website. To help create diversity on the selection of designs, Bruno Pierters also hosts other designers on the website; like CALLA for example, who does very beautiful colourful digital prints; Maison des Talons, a shoe company that has made a unique series of vegan and skin friendly stilettos; and Muriée that has made a complete organic series of everyday blouses and sweaters. These brands are just some of the designer brands that contribute to the Honest by website and they all follow the same terms of transparency and sustainability as the apparel by Pieters.

The transparent future For the moment, Bruno Pieters has started to set up his own initiative to speed up the process of spreading new transparent and “green” designers, who have a less exploiting attitude towards Mother Earth. Through a competition called The FFDS (The Future Fashion Designer Scholarship) Honest by has created a design contest where students can submit an application (between 5th of June and 25th of August) with their MA collection. If the designs are talented enough to win the staggering prize of 10,000 Euro (13,605 USD), in return the student has to make a 100% transparent and animal-free MA collection. Not a bad way to spread the word to younger generations of designers.

Less Magazine is therefore excited to see what projects Pieters and his Honest by company will be doing in the future and how many companies might be inspired to follow his lead. But as Pieters himself states, it is not only about the companies making a change, it is just as, if not even more, important that the customers’ awareness of their clothing becomes the same as their awareness of their veggies, “I created the brand because transparency was what I was looking for as a consumer but couldn’t find. I’m using it as a tool for change. Change doesn’t start with institutions. The pyramid of power in fashion has the designer at the bottom, then the CEO, then the shareholders, and at the very top is the consumer.” Maybe it will not be as excessive a change in openness for all bigger fashion houses as it is for Honest by, but even the smallest step counts in changing transparency in fashion.

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I n ter vi ew

Obscur – R ich a r d S ö d e rb e r g

by Malthe S. Rye Thomsen pictures by Phillip Koll

“A garment’s true value can only be fully recognized when it is being worn”

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I am sitting on the tram through Berlin on my way to do an interview with Richard Söderberg, the man behind the Swedish fashion brand Obscur.

I alight at a stop in Friedrichshain in East Berlin close to the studio. The area seems very quiet and industrial but to the left of the studio is a club called Sissyfos, which is still blaring out music at 12 am and people from another world are going in and out. In Berlin there is space for everyone and it sometimes seems as though Berlin never sleeps. Berlin is a never-ending blend of environments: Close to the club’s vigorous life, Obscur’s studio is located in an industrial building. Meanwhile the club blares out music the whole day they are in the studio working with patterns, sewing and fitting.

Richard smilingly opens the door to us and we follow him up several flights in this very raw huge industrial building. The raw styled studio is filled with black and grey clothing hanging in every corner and in the middle sits a newly designed chair.

Richard sits at a sewing machine and starts to sew. I start the interview. He explains that designing clothing was a calling and that everybody should do the things which make them happy.

“Really good things will happen when you are not thinking too much.”

Biography and early inspiration Richard started making clothing in his home town Helsingborg, Sweden for his friends and for fun. His friends began to pay him and he developed the idea of making a clothing collection.

As Richard puts it, he always fights for what he wants and he usually always gets it. But in the beginning the designing was very intuitive and spontaneous, which it sometimes still is.

“I had no plan at all and that sounds terrible, but if you love what you do, you don’t need a plan.”

Life in a small town like Helsingborg reduces the possibilities for inspiration, but Richard makes use of his imagination and Scandinavian heritage.

As Richard once explained: “Most of the time, when I am designing my clothes I imagine myself being somewhere else.” Some designers who live in, and are constantly inspired by, their surroundings in global cosmopolitical environments would most likely not have been able to work in the intricate way that Richard did.

The conformist environment surrounding him in Helsingborg, but also the sometimes rough, beautiful Swedish nature, inspire him to make very raw, protecting and heavy garments with a spirit and a sound drawn from the forest. Richard is very interested in deconstructing and exposing layers, and exploring a black niche of clothing, which as he explains would portray his inner feelings and show parts of his identity.

Together with the sounds of dark Scandinavia some of the most central inspirations have been music and his friends. Richard has a lot of friends who play music and music has always played a

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central role when he designs, and his friends have been wearing his clothing from the beginning. But making clothing for his friends was not enough.

He pursued the dream of making a collection instead of making different pieces of garment for friends.

Richard moved from Helsingborg to Stockholm, and he also lived in Tokyo for a year, where he, as he puts it, “developed a lot”. After moving back to Stockholm he won a huge national competition.

The competition itself didn’t really mean anything to him, but it was the recognition from his family, who has a very artistic background, that Richard really appreciated.

Then he moved to Copenhagen because he felt there was more space for stigmatized identities, such as the disabled, weirdly dressed people etc.

“I have always been interested in deformities, and things, people and objects that do not “FIT IN”” Furthermore, in Copenhagen Richard felt there was more space for people who you could portray as out of place like himself, he says. Even though Copenhagen was an inspiration, it was a springboard for Berlin, which offers daily inspiration through its higher tolerance of differences and diversity together with its genuine realness.

“People wearing all camou here (Berlin) are truer than most of the people running around wearing Rick Owens in Paris” Obscur comes with him and develops in Berlin, a city that has something that no other city in the world has. It is a world of music and style so raw, pure and almost untouched since the 90’s or even further back, Richard explains. There is something about Berlin that is disconnected from fashion and its pretentiousness, which Richard cherishes very much. He thinks that people here are truer to themselves, not going around trying

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to be somebody else, which he finds inspiring and stimulating: “There isn’t as much bullshit here in Berlin.” People in Berlin aren’t so affected by their surroundings compared to other places. Though Berlin is clearly a huge inspiration for Richard, it was a monumental experience when he first displayed his clothing in a showroom in Paris.

Participating in the Paris Men’s Fashion Week is crucial as Paris always enhances his focus on design, he explains, due to the atmosphere but also crucially due to the interaction with the customers. Richard portrays Paris as a place to receive feedback on what one has worked on for six months. He further explains how in the beginning the different buyers and agents really surprised him with their sometimes very passionate or peculiar personalities. He comments that he is sometimes annoyed with the fashion business in Paris whereas Berlin is the opposite, in that it is freer from the rules of fashion. That is why the collection he was working on when I interviewed him is very much inspired by Berlin: easy wearable clothing and slightly militaristic features.

Richard strongly emphasizes that Obscur is his life and as he changes, the brand changes with him. In these changes it seems like inspiration from music, his friends and the experimenting with and deconstruction of garments and ideas have had, and will continue to have, a central role.

Therefore, in his last 2- 3 collections he has experimented with new colors, fabrics and methods.

Production and materials Contrary to Richard’s spontaneous and intuitive designing style, he seems to have a more controlling managing style, which surfaces when we talk about production and materials. Initially, the production was located in Japan, Estonia, Bulgaria and Sweden, but since the Autumn/ Winter ’13 collection it has been centralized in Italy. He explains how he has been dining with his shoemakers and other work colleagues in Italy because he thinks a closer relationship will optimise the understanding of each other and

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the production. He believes it is very important to have a good relationship with the production agents and the factories where one´s clothing is produced because it can take a long time for them to understand what you as a designer really want. He criticizes a lot of brands for changing their production partners too often as he believes that if you keep the same partner your collection will be more personal and optimized.

In terms of materials, Richard generally only uses really heavy leather and wool fabrics. Most of the time, he uses calf leather as he thinks that lamb leather is too thin and too fragile, and explains that he likes hard and heavy fabrics, adding: “I don’t like soft things in general.”

Richard also uses pig leather because of the fantastic details. For example, you can see all the small holes where the hairs had been, and horse leather because of the firm and paper-like appearance. A lot of the materials Richard uses are double or triple layered. He combines and explores a lot of materials, often combining very rigid/sturdy ones with softer ones. This can be very challenging when you try to mix metal with leather or sheer fabric. Overall he considers himself most interested in exploring surfaces, interiors, dye processes and fits, rather than shapes and silhouettes.

Richard further explains that he is no longer particularly inspired by fabrics but much more by materials. He explains how different technical construction materials can really inspire him and he often thinks about using these materials, but most of the time it is not practical when designing clothes. Richard often takes traditional fabrics and tries to change the structure and make them sterile with lasers, fusing treatment etc. He underlines that he doesn’t really like fabrics at all, and that is very hard to find inspiring ones. Maybe that is a feeling he has adopted over time. He goes on to explain how materials and fabrics are so important, but at the same time so complex and impractical.

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“It is so complicated. When you are creating something there are so many things that need to fit. You have to think about the material, the sewing, the fusing, the lining, the patterning and the details and weight. So many things need to come together if you want to make the perfect structure…but the more you work with a fabric, the closer you get to the sweet spot” It is about pushing the boundaries within different fabrics and materials, but not to push them so much that you lose the feeling for your fabric.

You need be true to yourself and your buyers, but still explore and pursue development.

“The usage of non-conventional garment materials is only possible now because I’m working with new people that can actually manage these difficult materials. When using materials that are difficult to work with, the line between success and failure is very fine.”

Richard explains how difficult this is when a limited resource designer like himself only has a certain amount of time to work on a special garment. It’s a fine balance between exploring new territories and doing what you know and what you are good at because making clothing is very complex and you need to be aware of the ambiguous complications.

“So it’s very complex I think, to make clothing, because there are so many things that need to fit together, and now I’m not even talking about the interpretations of things, the photography, how the audience will react to a product etc. I’m just talking about the product itself. There are just so many different things, and I guess that’s what makes it interesting” The central idea for Richard is to push and develop his design skills to an even higher level every time he designs something new. He wants to be intuitively exploring and at the same time in control, when developing new garments which are either natural or non conventional. But central to him is still the importance of the look when you wear it and the well-crafted tailored garment that

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resonates his love for heavy materials, which clearly is a huge part of the identity of Obscur.

Identity In general the identity of Obscur has often been linked to Scandinavian and black heritage. Originally the identity was inspired by the monotonous life in Helsingborg, Sweden, and the huge Swedish woods, where silence, nature and man become one and with Richard’s passion for music, especially slightly dark music.

This heritage and the similarity with other black niche brands have produced a picture of Obscur rooted only in this niche genre. Richard tells me that he is very tired of this black heritage and that his own early fascination of this black nomadic niche heritage is not the same anymore. Richard doesn’t want to be captured in this niche. For Richard and maybe the central thing in the concept of Obscur, as he explains, is that he always comes back to the idea of very well crafted design and clothing.

“Colors, trends, and concept are always changeble but the very well crafted design will last forever. So that’s important to me” Upon reflecting on the identity and background of Obscur, he admits that he is fairly tired of the fashion business. It is not as fun as it used to be and that is why for the moment, he is also exploring a lot of different things in the context of his interest and passion for the artistic world and his clothing design.

“It’s not always the economically best strategy to do one’s brands as personally as mine but that’s how I want to do it and how I want to finish when the time comes. But I’m getting tired of the fashion scene, so here in the studio right now we are making a chair and I am taking a lot of photos right now and it makes me really happy, so I don’t know what the future will bring, but I know I want to sew less if I’m gonna keep on designing.”

Obscur and Richard will certainly change their

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attitudes towards life several times still. Richard work with a spontaneous and fearless attitude one has to admire in a cut-throat business where it can be very dangerous to follow your heart and take chances. But Richard doesn’t want to change that. Obscur is his life and he wants it to be personal, and he wants it to develop as he develops. But the central thing for Richard is the inspiration from his friends, music, and the foundation around the concept not of fashion, but well-crafted design as artistic expressions.

Momen ts a nd Memories by M r. Mong e

CONSUMERS

SOCIAL

R E L AT I O N S

by Phillip Monge I l l u s t a t i o n b y G e o r g i n a Te r r a g n i

You! Yeah, you! What are you wearing? I mean, what are you wearing right now? At this very moment as you’re reading my humble and ignoble words. And just to be clear: I do not expect an answer dirtier than my crotch after a spinning session if I were asking you through the chat-function on Tinder. I would only expect such a response from my girlfriend, who is probably not you because she tends to avoid reading any kind of bullshit typed by my fingers and ordered from the darkest nooks of my mind. Furthermore, we wouldn’t even make a match, you and I. On Tinder, of course. I can promise you that. You would never swipe me to the right.

Anyway, let’s get on with the cross-examination. What are you eating? Again, in this exact second. And what are you drinking?

Me? I am sitting in my favorite chair. Wearing an old and dirty T-shirt made in Honduras by an American company, or at least by a company that used to be American. However, I’m wearing a pair of shortened trousers made in Japan and tapered by me, in Denmark.

They look hideous because I am an awful tailor. That’s completely irrelevant, tho’. I’m drinking rum imported from Venezuela because I kinda like to feel like Hank Moody in Californication while I’m writing. I’m actually smoking as well, even though it’s banned in my rental. Totally Hank Moody, I know. My cigarettes are from an American company. Or at least from a company that used to be American. And they are made in the European Union. Authorized by a rich motherfucker in Switzerland.

What does that say about me? That I enjoy the life I have been given and that I’m trying my best to shorten the length of it as much as possible? Probably, yes. But, it says nothing more than that.

Anyhow, my life aside; back to you! Cuz’ I never got an answer. Right now, you might be standing in line to get your croissant and a cup of Fair Trade coffee from that ‘little place down at the corner’, where the barista’s fat fuck of a boss donates ten cents for every six-dollar cappuccino he swipes over the shop counter to the poor and helpless kids of a random jungle in Eastern India. You’ll probably grab both “to go” with the espresso latte in a brown au natural paper cup, which has been reused about seven times, and cover it with an additional sleeve bearing a huge global approved green stamp that instantly yells out something like this:

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“HEY WORLD, LOOK AT ME! I’M SUPER CONSCIOUS ABOUT MY CHOICES IN LIFE. I EVEN USE A RECYCLED RUBBER WHEN MY PARTNER AND I OCCASIONALLY FUCK EVERY THIRD OR FOURTH MONTH.” If that scenario is even remotely true, you can be sure of one thing: If you are wearing a piece of clothing from the fashionable equivalent to IKEA®, i.e. H&M®, then grab the nearest lamppost and swing from it whilst at the same time tearing off your bad conscience as if you were Magic Mike in, of course, Magic Mike. I have never seen that movie, by the way.

Simply put, it is just not possible to walk around with an undoubtedly clear conscience whilst rubbing shoulders with the annoying sales team from Greenpeace, when you buy your gasoline from anywhere but Shell, get your back scratched by the peeps from PETA because your designer bag is from Stella McCartney® or ask the volunteers from Red Cross® to wipe the dirt from your left shoulder in return for a monetary donation, if you still get overly excited and plan to camp out in front of the nearest H&M® store three days before the collaboration with Alexander Wang® hits.

Even though H&M® has had a complicated love affair with UNICEF over the last couple of years, it is still the largest buyer of clothes from Bangladesh, which is a country infamous for inferior safety at work exemplified a couple of years ago, when over a thousand employees were killed under the roof of a collapsed building.

I am not telling you to cut out H&M®. I am just telling you to cut out the bullshit. There is no such thing as corporate social responsibility. CSR is what in the western world will be described as consumers’ social relations. If you want to experience your superficial relations to bloom then pursue CSR.

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Visua li za tion

A big part of Less Magazine is to let creative people show their talents.

Visualization is a s ection divided into three parts as we choose three different stylists or photographers to interpret a theme given by the editors of the magazine visually. In this issue the theme to be interpreted was: Transparency. We hope you enjoy the way the theme has been interpreted.

MALOU BUM BUM “To lose something or someone you love can make you feel transparent, it can make the world feel transparent or it can itself be transparent. The love that remains is visible transparency�

Stylist Nanna Lindskow Make-up artist: Lisanne Kotkiewicz Henriksen, Assistant Sophie Bendixen Model Klara Refshale

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81 Pants - Stylist’s own, Body chain by Zarah Voigt B

Jacket by Barbara i Gongin i B Skirt - Stylist’s own 82 Stillettos - Vintage G Earrings by Zarah Voigt B

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Shirt - Stylist’s own, Top by Barbara I Gongini B Earrings by Zarah Voigt B

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Headpiece by Barbara I Gongini B

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Inter view

TO DARE TO BE WHO YOU ARE

I n t e r v i e w w i t h T i g r a n Av e t i s y a n

by Pernille Hammershøj Photos by Nadya Filatova Since Russian-born, Moscow-based Central Saint Martins’ graduate Tigran Avetisyan released his first collection, the hype has been remarkable.

Just over a month ago Less Magazine met with the up-and-coming talent, when he was in Paris to show his latest collection during the Paris Men’s Fashion Week. This turned out to be a joyful meeting with time for reflection, as Tigran Avetisyan expressed his viewpoints on being honest and what, according to him, transparency is all about. Under the sponsorship of LVMH, Tigran Avetisyan launched his graduate collection and has thus been featured in top press journals but despite the hype, he seems like a reflective individual who certainly does not take his success for granted.

I met with Tigran Avetisyan at the metro stop “Parmentier” in the 11th arrondissement of Paris. He had quickly replied to my interview request and suggested that we meet at the metro stop before finding a nice spot for the interview. Tigran’s girlfriend keeps us company as the three of us stroll down the streets of Paris. A few minutes later, and we have found the perfect spot: a nice informal café, with doors invitingly open towards the street. We order coffee and I switch

on my dictaphone, while telling Tigran that the theme of Issue 03 is “transparency”. The million-dollar question seems thus to be: how do you interpret the concept of “transparency”? If you look it up in the dictionary, “transparency” is about being transparent, in the more literal sense of the word: being able to see through an object.

To Less Magazine, “transparency” is about daring to communicate where garments are fabricated, under which production methods and whether or not the fashion brand cares about environmental sustainability. When I presented these definitions and reflections to Tigran, he replied: “To me, the most important thing is being honest.

Being honest in the way you speak to people, and being honest about being yourself and not trying to be someone else. I think basically, that’s transparency to me.”

Being honest about yourself and who you are seem to be the building blocks of Tigran’s personality and thus his designs. Despite the hype and interest he has received, this young, promising talent is humble when he talks about his designs, and this approach seems to be a conscious decision and strategy:

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“I don’t want to be someone else. If you stay true to yourself, I think you will achieve good results in your work. That you are not pretending to be another person or another designer than you actually are. It’s about transparency –about showing who you are at any given time, and not being embarrassed about it.

What you see is what you get.”

“I mean for me, I always think: is this really myself and what I am about? To be honest, I have a very strange feeling each time I complete a collection.

Sometimes when I look at it I don’t recognize it as being my work.”

Tigran has an idea about why he sometimes does not recognize his work once it’s done: “I think there are so many sides to me that it’s really difficult to express myself with one single collection.

When you do a collection, you have to be very focused, and you have to put forward a very straightforward message. You can’t say everything with one collection - it’s impossible. If you try, it will be a mess. Therefore, when I do a collection I always limit

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myself, and I always put myself under some sort of constraint. Once a new collection is out you are only seeing one part of me.”

This is the reason why Tigran is always surprised at how his best collections turn out. Furthermore, he expresses himself as a person who likes to discover something new, surprise himself and thus hopefully surprise his audience. The importance Tigran underlines about choosing a message for each collection has literally been carried out in his work: His ultimate remark has become his use of slogans, which seems to be ‘choked’ onto the garments just before the lights go on and the first model appears on the catwalk. Tigran’s definition of transparency: ‘to stay true to yourself’ is once again important in this context. When I met with Tigran, he explained that once his graduate collection was completed, he felt that something was missing. Tigran was lucky enough to be sponsored by the high-fashion-power-machine LVMH but many of his classmates suffered from financial difficulties. As he felt the stressed atmosphere this caused, he decided to stay true

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to his senses. Thus, at the last minute, and just before the deadline, Tigran decided to add quotes to the garments, and these were simply lines he had picked up while listening to his classmates discuss their financial difficulties. The slogans and words that end up on a piece by Tigran Avetisyan are therefore clearly not chosen by coincidence. When I met Tigran in Paris, he explained that the slogans are more than a message, as his vision with the slogans is that they can create a dialogue between people: “It’s not really about a message, but more a dialogue.

I think it’s good to have conversations. I do what I do, because I want to have a dialogue and I think fashion is the most appropriate form of dialogue.

Even though there is a lot of glamour surrounding it, I think that fashion is a very down-to-earth media.”

In explaining why Tigran believes fashion is a media, which can be used as a down-to-earth communication tool, he underlines the fact that it is much faster compared to other creative practices: “Fashion collections are really quick: you have your message and if you are good at what you do, people will get it, they will respond to it, and there will be a dialogue, a fashion shoot and some people will be wearing it down the street, protesting - I don’t know, in some sort of way. I find that really, really interesting because it’s very democratic and down-to-earth.”

Here a dilemma arises as on the one hand Tigran recognizes the advantages of the fast-moving fashion industry, yet on the other hand he tries to oppose it. In this regard he told me that even though he does not want to appear aggressive or as someone who criticizes the industry from above, he is aware of the disadvantages of the speed at which the fashion industry is moving.

Thus, he explained that his Autumn/Winter 2014 collection was the moment when he had the most questions, focusing on one in particular: What will remain? Communicating his message by producing the video “The Interview”, Tigran’s focus was as follows: Nowadays, fashion designers are often obliged to produce around four collections a year, but the industry seldom asks itself why that many collections have to be produced, and for what purpose. Here a professional dilemma is at stake since Tigran explains that he has to respond to the fact that his success causes the need to please other people, and to try to fit in because he has to keep up with the pace of the rest of the industry. He does not elaborate further, but one can be pleased by the fact that he is an up-and-coming designer who dares to pose questions, and therefore might be able to influence the dominating viewpoints of the industry.

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Interview

‘The Fabric Source’ & Trine Wackerhausen

by Pernille KrĂźger The Fabric Source is a platform that provides all the necessary facilities for designers, purchasers, and other production stakeholders. Samples, inspiration, color books, swatches, professional textbooks and databases - all on one platform.

So instead of seeking individual suppliers, the platform provides a shared database and information about where and how to produce more sustainably.

In the heart of the city lies Design Society Denmark, not very far from the beautiful City Hall in Copenhagen. This is the starting point: A society

that has developed through years of experience, knowledge and visions, working closely with the international design industry. It serves as a forum where business, designers, science and creative souls meet.

It used to be home to a wide range of design exhibitions, but since 2013 the building has housed a handful of strong, individually profiled, international design organizations: Danish Design Institute (DDC), Danish Fashion Institute (DAFI) and INDEX: Design to Improve Life (INDEX). These three organizations work both individually and

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together on creating a future for design - and to place Denmark, or more specifically the phenomenon ‘Danish Design’- right in the middle of it all.

So now that we have got it right - knowing what part Design Society Denmark has in relation to DAFI (Danish Fashion Institute) - we can move on to the core theme of the article: The Fabric Source, described by DAFI as following; ... “The Fabric Source is the first Nordic sustainable fabric platform, created for the fashion and textile industry. The project is a unique joint initiative led by the Danish Fashion Institute (DAFI), under Nordic Initiative, Clean and Ethical (NICE) in close collaboration with leading partners within the textile industry, such as CLASS, Source4Style, Better Cotton Initiative and Sustainable Apparel Coalition” ...

Right now The Fabric Source offers more than 1,000 sustainable fabrics from over 30 countries, with the intention to add more on an ongoing basis. One of the biggest suppliers to the Fabric Source is Italian CLASS (Creativity Lifestyle And Sustainable Synergy).

CLASS divides their materials into three main categories: Natural and Organic Textiles made from wool, silk, cashmere, yak, cotton, linen, hemp and nettle; Repurposed and Recycled Fabrics made from recycled polyester (eg. Newlife), recycled polyamide, cashmere, cotton, denim, silk and wool (eg. cardato regenerated co2 neutral) created to reduce carbon footprint; Innovative Renewables, new biopolymers (eg. Ingeo), paper, milk protein, soy, seaweed, regenerated cellulosic’s (eg. Monocel) wood pulp fiber (eg.

Lenpur), bamboo, modal/micromodal and crab’s carapace fiber (eg. Crabyon).

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The platform also has access to a range of different online sustainable tools. For example, The Higg Index and The RDM-Beta tool. Users are able to test the fabrics that they are already using in order to find better alternatives in the Fabric Source. That way users have the opportunity to see the changes that they are able to make, just by using a sustainable fabric. It is also possible to test single styles or entire collections and measure the environmental and social impacts across the products’ lifecycle and throughout the value chain. These tools help the production stakeholders, for example the designer, to create changes towards a more sustainable fashion future.

But who uses the newly launched Fabric Source at DAFI and what do they think of it as users? I had the pleasure of speaking to Trine Wackerhausen - the founder and creative director of the Danish fashion brand, Wackerhaus.

Trine Wackerhausen is an extraordinary warmhearted person, and although she had a tight and fully booked calendar, she squeezed me in on a Wednesday afternoon. A small and charming city house at Østerbro, in the East end of Copenhagen, creates the frame around the firm. I was welcomed by a very charming woman, who showed me to the back of the house where Trine had her office. She was just finishing off a meeting, which gave me the perfect opportunity to make my own first impressions. It was cozy, but she had made a creative space in a very modest and cool way, with all the equipment she needed. And as a guest I felt welcome – it almost felt like home. I don’t know if this was down to the people or the fact that it was a regular apartment furnished like an office - or maybe both, I don’t know.

A few moments later, Trine came out and invited me into her office. I sat down in the chair across from her, and we immediately started talking - I

almost forgot to turn on my recorder. I asked her to specify the vision for herself as a designer and owner of the brand Wackerhaus. Her aim was to create functional design with an architectural reference in the shape of the clothes - a classic look with a feminine twist to it, she explained. Because her silhouettes are often very simple and clean, she puts a great deal of time and energy into finding the right materials - where structures and colors are essential. This creates an obvious balance between simplicity and complexity in the expression of her designs.

But where does she find her materials? The materials are found mostly through local Danish agents or at the bigger international textile fairs in Denmark and Paris. Due to the fact that she sometimes needs a smaller piece of a certain material, it becomes hard to find the right ones. Not many textile agencies are willing to sell smaller pieces, which for her obviously becomes a deal breaker. Not only would it be economically irresponsible to buy a bigger piece than necessary, due to a minimum demand from the textile agent, but it would also certainly be acting irresponsibly towards the environment.

Moving on, we talk about the wishes and hopes for the future of Wackerhaus. It seems that next year could be a serious and bigger step towards sustainable fabric choices for the company.

‘The new Fabric Source at DAFI has really opened my eyes. When I first started up the brand, sustainable materials were not really an option. The kind of

materials that I was searching for had a huge demand of complexity to the structure of the fabric.

At that time, sustainable fabrics were very plain and ordinary, and they didn’t really appeal to me. But now that I have seen the development that sustainable fabrics have undergone, I am thinking in terms of sustainable options for the first time, which I am really excited about.’

At the moment the company is producing locally in Europe with lower minimums of production.

They are also closely connected to the production places and the employees working there, with regular check-ups on the social environment.

Wackerhaus feel that they have an authentic insight into the production and the people involved - Trine comments: ‘You have to do your check-ups as a design team - all the way around the supply chain. But there comes a point where things will get out of hand, and then you have to trust and rely on other people to do their job, as they say they will, or as you tell them to do.’

Better times are on the way for designers who want to engage in social responsibility and the environment when designing and producing their garments. We are seeing more collaborations like The Fabric Source library coming to life. This clearly is a sign of the industry starting to take steps in the direction towards both transparency and a new responsible way of consuming clothes.

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Wackerhaus’ design for the Fashion Summit design challenge.

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Visua li za tion

A big part of Less Magazine is to let creative people show their talents.

Visualization is a s ection divided into three parts as we choose three different stylists or photographers to interpret a theme given by the editors of the magazine visually. In this issue the theme to be interpreted was: Transparency. We hope you enjoy the way the theme has been interpreted.

DANIELA REINER “Transparency is the ability of materials to let light pass through. It breathes openness, beauty and calmness.

This story reflects transparency with a genuine approach to fashion, by selecting garments from designers working with sustainability and with a focus on slow fashion.

Good quality in materials and fit, with timeless design and colors. This is luxury that does not grow old.

Simplicity is the key, with a modern touch of fine lines and areas of transparency reflecting clarity and visibility. ”

Styling and text Sarah Neuhard Make-up Camilla Jönsson using Nvey Eco Hair Camilla Jönsson using Kevin Murphy

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1 02 Leather vest - SarahNeuhard B

Top by BEATE - GODAGER B Tights by DAVID ANDERSEN B Silver Accessories vintage by ‘Something Special` G

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Silk pants by SarahNeuhard B Top by Therese Dyveke Holst B Shoes by Borrowed from Beate - Godager B Accessory by vintage from ‘Something Special’ B

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Top: Silk Blouse by SarahNeuhard B Bottom: Silk Body by SarahNeuhard B Silver Accessories by Vintage ‘something special’ G

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107 Dress: BEATE by GODAGER B