#W Presents The Spring Edition (2019)

UK Edition Spring/2019

The Sustainable Luxury Report

by Yasmin Jones-Henry

Presents Sustainable fashion According to:

Christopher Raeburn Priya Ahluwalia Mother of Pearl Katherine Hamnett MBE

Spring

Edition

Héritier Frères is sold exclusively in the UK, at Harrods, London and online via www.workinfashion.me 2

HERITIER FRERES

HERITIER FRERES

Héritier Frères is sold exclusively in the UK, at Harrods, London and online via www.workinfashion.me 3

#SUSTAINABLE FASHION

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#SOCIAL ENTERPRISE

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ORDER NOW

www.workinfashion.me

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CONTENTS EDITOR’S LETTER Pp. 8-9

FOREWORD Have Consumers Fallen Out of Love With Fast Fashion?

Pp. 10-12

#WORKINFASHION PRESENTS...

The Visual Diet

Pp. 15-16

PERSPECTIVE In Defence of Millennials Pp. 17-18

THE SUSTAINABLE LUXURY REPORT The Environmental Committee Report Pp. 19-25 LFWM/LFW Highlights

Pp. 26-31

Events Pp. 32-42

#WLookBook(SS19) Pp. 43-53 ©2019 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED URBAN FLOW DESIGNS LTD

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Demystifying fashion, was one of the primary objectives when @WorkinFashion.me was launched in 2016. I base my entire perception of fashion on it’s original meaning.

Taken from the Latin ‘Facere’ meaning ‘to do or to make’, ‘fashion’ in it’s purest since is a much broader term. It’s more than the seasonal trend. It encapsulates human productivity. Creativity, artisanship, skill, innovation, agriculture, processing, and of course ‘manufacturing’ which traces it’s etymology from ‘Facere’.

If you’re talking about fashion, you’re talking about the environment: crop rotation, water, irrigation, pollution, fertilisers, local subsistence farmers and industrial farms.

If you’re talking about fashion, you’re talking about economics. A sector that in the UK alone generates over £32 billion a year and is forecast to grow to £76 billion a year in GDP by 2023 (Mintel, 2018).You’re also talking about a sector that employs over 890,000. A sector that generates 1 in 6 jobs in London alone. (British Fashion Council, 2019).

If you’re talking about fashion, you’re also talking about politics. Government policy, the impact of foreign direct investment. A sector that still relies heavily on female labour, thus exploitation and the issue of women’s rights and discrimination in the workplace.

“Fashion is identified as one of five key industries implicated in modern day slavery.”

(Global Slavery Index, 2018)

After food and shelter, clothing is next in line for the necessary essentials for human survival.

Fashion wasn’t designed to be a frivolous affair.

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2018 brought with it a host of hard hitting documentaries revolving around plastic waste and the use of slave labour in the fast fashion supply chains. The power of television was reaffirmed in the millions of viewers reacting in horror to the nation’s consumption of plastic goods. Nothing has been more effective in bringing home the environmental impact of plastics on the environment than footage of a sea turtle choking on a straw.

People will continue to go back and forth arguing whether fashion is the biggest polluter, whether it’s in first place or in the top five, the fact the industry, globally contributes more pollution than aircraft and sea vessels combined, is indicative of the scale of environmental damage we are dealing with.

The Environmental Audit Committee’s report that was released 19th February 2019, delivered some home truths that place the host of fast fashion retailers and manufactures who had been summoned to give evidence under the spotlight of public scrutiny.

After interrogating the decision makers for firms such as Boohoo, MisGuided, Sports Direct, ASOS, Marks and Spencers and a host of other high street brands, the EAC’s verdict has sent tremors through the industry. The opening line of the report declares that the current business model is ‘unsustainable’.

Responsibility for saving our planet lies with us, the consumer , the retailer, the manufacturer, the farmers, fashion buyers and of course the government. Without legislation, incentives and punitive measure, real tangible progress will remain intangible.

Special thanks to Orsola de Castro, Sarah Mower MBE, Nina Marenzi, Mary Creagh MP, Katherine Hamnett MBE, Amy Powney and Graeme Raeburn.

Yasmin Jones-Henry Editor-in-Chief

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#Foreword

Have Consumers Fallen Out of Love With Fast Fashion?

By Yasmin Jones-Henry 2018 will forever be remembered as a watershed moment in fashion, because it’s the year rhetoric about ethical fashion, sustainable fashion and the evils of fast fashion – exploded into the mainstream.

Monday 17th December, 2018 – ASOS – online retailer and much feted golden child of fast fashion announced a dramatic 40% drop in shares. By the evening other retailers including Boohoo, Next and Marks and Spencer’s, also revealed a fall in their share prices too.

This was swiftly followed by a wave of panic as these retailers sought to slash their prices further in order to shift unwanted stock. Other brands including Primark and TK Maxx also waded in posting further reductions amidst preparations for what they have deemed will be a difficult Christmas.

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Journalists – guided by press releases, repeated the line that this is all due to Brexit. Millennials being made nervous by the lack of clarity over their future. Yes, because that’s what’s stopping Shaniqua from buying that £5 bodycon sequined dress online. Brexit.

Other retailers have tried to frame this as being part of the slow and ongoing decline of Britain’s traditional high street as the result of fiercer competition from online retailers who have the comparative advantage of lower taxes, and larger economies of scale. This is a problem – but not the only culprit.

No, something much more significant is at hand. We are witnessing the death of fast fashion. For those of us who have been championing the virtues of ethical fashion –

#Foreword even before the Rana Plaza disaster of 2013, this has been a slow and painful process. Getting people to recognise that their cheap and convenient clothes, were made out of someone else’s suffering – has been no easy task. One of the psychological defects of rampant consumerism is it that it desensitises its victims, leaving them bloated with an excess of cheap, poor quality and easily disposable clothes.

Then factor in social media. Influencer marketing kicked this consumerist habit into overdrive, with Barclaycard producing a report this summer revealing that 1 in 10 of their customers in the UK has been found to purchase, photograph themselves wearing, then return the same items all within the same week. 1 in 5 being aged between 35-44. This is madness. Literally. People are abusing their own access to credit, to consume and then regurgitate clothes that they have no real intention of wearing or keeping. Everything – and I mean everything is just for show.

So as ASOS retreats to recalibrate their figures and talk up their modest 14% growth this year, few will deny there are multiple factors at work that have forced the fast fashion wheels to come to a screeching halt. Companies like ASOS, Boohoo and Primark all tailored their marketing campaigns to appeal to the Instagram-Influencer led generation.

Many of whom expect payment before they take a selfie wearing said item.

So, in addition to boomerang sales, these brands are now having to allocate a small fortune for online marketing – just to get people to wear the clothes. But how are they supposed to measure the return on investment if those followers simply go out to ‘Snap and Send Back’ their goods?

How do they measure sales and projected growth if x% of their stock will be returned within the same month?

Clean Living means No Plastics Then we move onto current lifestyle trends. Veganism is trending. Wellness is trending. In the UK alone the wellness industry is estimated to be worth €26 billion (figures provided by the Global Wellness Institute). Ethical fashion, sustainable fashion, clean living and waste reduction are all part of this wellness trend.

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Recent campaigns on the use of microplastics by the UK government and the EU have been successful in getting consumers to pay attention to the level of harm rampant consumerism is doing to the environment. As a result, these retailers who have happily incorporated the use of cheap plastics into their production processes, now find themselves at odds not only with their desired Instagram audience, but the government as well.

October saw the announcement of the Parliamentary Environmental Audit Committee in which these same firms: ASOS, Primark, TK Maxx, Next, Boohoo, Debenhams, Topshop and Marks and Spencer’s, have all been called to account. The UK’s biggest high street brands are on trial. Their use of plastics, suppliers with unethical labour practices – often including child and slave labour, were all called into question. Their founders, CEOs and senior management teams were all summoned to give an account of company practices.

One question in particular from the MP Lisa Cameron resonated as she queried how a brand such as ASOS could afford to sell their garments so cheaply and pay the workers a minimum wage. The answer was less than satisfactory. And in truth, consumers know the real answer.

And here lies the source of the current crisis on the British High Street. As the consumer has rediscovered their conscience, the brands who abandoned theirs for more than a decade, now find themselves out of favour.

[Cont]

#Foreword The simple truth is, nobody wants to wear a tshirt made by a child slave – even if it retails at £2. The stench of exploitation that lingers around these fast fashion brands is one they will not be able to cast off so easily.

Consumer Accountability With heightened media scrutiny, the stories are now out in the open. Sarah O’ Connor’s report for the Financial Times on brands such as Boohoo profiting from the previously undetected use of slave labour here in the UK (Leicester) helped to bring this matter to Parliament’s door. Orsola De Castro’s “Who Made My Clothes Campaign” saw her non profit organisation Fashion Revolution, bring the very subject of consumer accountability to the fore on the anniversary of the Rana Plaza disaster which saw over 1,000 people lose their

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The factory supplied many of the UK’s high street brands including Primark. The campaign encouraged consumers to take their garments to the till, and demand greater clarity and transparency on how and where these clothes were made.

The truth is, fast fashion wasn’t built on a sustainable business model, it always had a sell by date, and now this date is upon us. The 20th century capitalist business model of simply producing and selling more stuff has reached the point of saturation. As we saw in the banking sector in the build up to the financial crisis during the last decade, greed has made the fashion industry rotten to its very core. Now the consumer is into clean living, environmentally friendly causes and ethics is officially trending: Fast fashion, is no longer in fashion. BYE FELICIA! [End]

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Birdsong, London

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#WorkinFashionPresents

‘Sans Filter’: The Visual Diet

by Yasmin Jones-Henry ‘Sans Filter’ is the best way to describe Marine Tanguy.

‘Woman On a Mission’ is another. Our conversation is the equivalent of an adrenaline shot.

For those of you who have read “When The World is Not Enough” and “Influencers Are So Last Season”, you will be well versed on what I think about the dark side of ‘influencer marketing’ and the toxic content often found on social media.

So, when Marine first contacted me to arrange a time to speak, I was excited to learn more about a campaign she has inspired through her work in raising awareness about the relationship between mental health. visual content and social media.

“I wanted to talk to you, because I know you get it” Marine explains. When I answered her call she was running between meetings, breathless as

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this campaign begins to gather serious momentum.

This first week in February has brought her so much media attention already. The front cover of the Sunday Times newspaper, multiple reposts on social media with the hashtag #VisualDiet trending in all directions.

The initiative is being led by Mimi Gray, Head of Visual Content at M&C Saatchi in partnership with Marine Tanguy (CEO of MTArt Agency, an awardwinning agency for up and coming visual artists) and world-renowned British Photographer Rankin, who believes that selfie culture is both monotonous and dangerous.

The health of our visual diet and its impact on our mental health will be explored

using this campaign as a case study.

In a public statement Rankin said: “Imagery, like anything else, can be healthy or harmful, addictive or nutritious.

And now, more so than ever, this has become a massive issue with the huge cultural impact of social media.

Every platform is full of hyper-retouched and highly addictive imagery, and it’s messing people up. As a photographer, I feel like my medium has been hijacked by people that are misusing and abusing its power.”

The Visual Diet project also includes an in agency exhibition of five inspiring artists throughout January, plus an Instagram account and a website, visualdiet.co.uk, where people can vote for which >

#WorkinFashionPresents images they feel have a positive or negative effect. A digital poster, which uses AI technology developed by M&C Saatchi, will read people’s reactions to different images as they walk past. The poster will be fed with a range of content, from journalistic photography, to sports, celebrity, art, illustration and everything in between. Logging all interactions, both positive and negative, from people’s facial expressions, the poster technology will score each image with a positive engagement mark, killing off those that receive negative feedback.

It is the succinct and impactful way Marine breaks down the reasoning behind this campaign, that gets my attention. Her use of the analogy of food, nutrition and junk food and the juxtaposition to the visual content we absorb, post and share everyday – is a stroke of genius. “Social media isn’t all bad. After all, if it wasn’t for Instagram, I wouldn’t have found you,” Marine tells me. We both agree that when it comes to building networks, when used in a positive way, social media has its benefits.

This observation provoked me to share my own experience during our conversation of the period when I first joined Instagram in 2016. A work colleague (Dimple Khatri) at the Financial Times, who used to sit behind me in the office, would share those motivational memes whenever she spotted I was having a bad day.

I was battling my way back from a relapse with Anorexia, and used the platform as a way

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that Instagram doesn’t have to be a place fraught with danger.to curate a gallery filled with positive quotes, publications that posted constructive content and fashion/art/lifestyle related accounts that had similar tastes in the aesthetic. Looking at interior design ideas, beautiful fashion photography archives, food critics and chefs such as Nina Parker (who later sent me her books) all helped me to sustain a positive attitude towards food and lifestyle. I know firsthand #DoinItForThaGram But as Marine points out, studies have shown Instagram is a breeding ground for egocentric, narcissistic and sexually explicit content (think Brand Kardashian). For young impressionable teenagers and people who may not be aware that they are vulnerable, the constant absorption of content that has no intellectual nutrition can have sinister effects on their wellbeing.

The tech, as Marine reiterates, isn’t the problem, it’s the user taking responsibility for how they use it – that’s the key. The Visual Diet is more than a flash in the pan

ad campaign. Marine explains that her long-term mission is to finalise some form of criteria, (the advertising industry’s equivalent to the Fairtrade badge) where consumers and brands alike are able to gauge and assess how toxic or enriching a particular campaign is. This need for some form of regulation comes after a surge in news reports of teenagers in the UK committing suicide following their exposure to suicidal/dark content on platforms such as Instagram.

We (as a society) are witnessing the early stages of a lifestyle revolution. We are reassessing what we wear, what we eat, how we live and what influences we permit to exert power over our lives. Brands need to be more responsible about the narrative they project. Users need to be more accountable for their own agency and ability to filter what and who they follow and the platform providers who rake in billions a year from advertising revenue, need to become better acquainted with ethics.

The Ethical Revolution is well and truly on its way!

#PERSPECTIVE

In Defence of Millennials

By Yasmin Jones-Henry Listen up Baby Boomers: Millennials care about lifestyle. We care about interiors. We care about design.

We love the aesthetic too.

I don’t even know where this misinformation about my generation came from or who decided that because we were raised in a century that brought with it Wi-Fi and instant messaging, that as a result of our association with tech they deduced we somehow had no aspiration for the finer things in life.

This topic is a source of irritation for a number of reasons. But mostly because it’s the epitome of #fakenews. Some old person, filled with resentment for all that is young and new, sat in a darkened room, and invented that wretched label ‘Millennials’– and proceeded to assign a profile to everyone born after 1982.

Standing at a colleague’s leaving do last year, a friend (who is 7 years older than me and born in the 1980s) turned and began to vent. “You know I really don’t get why they bunch us all together in the same age bracket. You were born in ’92.

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A totally different decade to the 80s.” Fair point. “Also, I graduated in the middle of the financial crisis in 2008. The world looked totally different for me, than it did for you.” Taking another sip of my drink I raised an eyebrow to show that I had taken her point.

“Also…” there was more… “I’m in my thirties. I have (no offence) a higher salary and more disposable income than you. You rent. I just purchased my first property…”

These words have been gnawing away in the back of my conscience ever since. This is an epic oversight by brands and publications.

With every magazine, brand and ad agency that fails in its attempt to relate to Millennials, they only show us, just how little they actually know us. Drawing from a demographic that spans such huge strides in technology and social engineering, is a big deal. It’s the difference between having an i-pod or cassette player and vinyl.

[Cont]

#PERSPECTIVE It’s the difference between going to the arcade, and having a PSP (Plays Station Portable). It’s the difference between posting your prom pictures in a photo album on Facebook or sticking them into an actual photo album. It’s the difference between being in a group chat with your school friends, and actually having to go to a park or a ‘place’ to play with friends.

It is true, as a result of camera phones, social media, 3G internet –the Millennial’s social experience as an impressionable child walking into teenagehood is a very different experience to their elders… But the fundamentals throughout history seldom change. When selling anything, it’s a cardinal sin to presume. What do people want? What do Milllennials want? Has anyone actually asked us?

Well, I’ll tell you. We want to live well. It’s that simple. For those of us who were in our early teens when the world plunged into the financial crisis of 2007-2008, many of us would have been sitting in classrooms, preparing for exams in the hope of future employment – without any security that there would even be a future, as we watched footage of grown ups in suits, walking out of offices with boxes containing all their earthly belongings.

In London, property prices came crashing down. In England, we have a saying, ‘an Englishman’s home is his castle’ – well with the castles under siege, we were left feeling vulnerable, unsafe and uncertain as to how long this instability would last. Then of course let’s not forget climate change…the Iraq war, Afghanistan… When I think back to 2000-2010 – I reflect on the transition from an 8 year old to an 18 year old, trying desperately to make sense of a world that was evidently going through an existential crisis.

So is it any surprise that now, this same demographic have entered the job market, can vote and have some measure of consumer power, they are using their power to champion the very essence of stability itself.

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#Sustainability. Veganism is a symptom of a growing conscience and awareness that if we, the next generation do not break with the toxic habits of our predecessors, we will have no planet to call home. The dietary revolution is part of a wider movement often referred to as #wellness on Instagram. Wanting to live well, to have good mental health, pleasant surroundings and nothing but positive vibes – amounts to an industry estimated to be worth 26 billion Euros in the UK (Wellness Institute, 2017).

So whoever keeps touting that line that ‘Millennials don’t care about lifestyle’ clearly has no relationship with reality or no internet access to research the data.

Sitting among my peers last week, this topic came up over coffee. One friend laughed as she confessed she picks restaurants and venues based on the decor and the ‘vibes’. We might not be able to furnish country homes, but interiors – the aesthetic is still a big influencer when it comes to our senses and our spending habits. If we are more fiscally challenged than our parent’s generation, then we want products that are well made – with the best materials.

Name brands don’t move us. Heritage? How about merit?

It’s true, the actions of our parent’s generation, the state of the economy and the current job market we have inherited means we will be less prosperous than the Baby Boomers.

But, that doesn’t equate to being poor. We are less profligate. There’s a difference. We care about the environment. We care about ethics.

Strap yourselves in folks! 2019 will see more ethical and sustainable luxury lifestyle brands and designers featured on @WorkinFashion.me and in the next edition of #TheCollective. If they won’t give the people what they want… then I will.

[END]

SPRING 2019

The

Sustainable Luxury Report

by Yasmin Jones-Henry

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“Sustainability is about common sense and efficiency” – Orsola De Castro (Fashion Rev, 2019)

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#TSLReport

The Sustainable Luxury Report “Fashion is identified as one of five key industries implicated in modern day slavery.”

(Global Slavery Index, 2018)

After food and shelter, clothing is next in line for the necessary essentials for human survival. Fashion wasn’t designed to be a frivolous affair.

2018 brought with it a host of hard hitting documentaries revolving around plastic waste and the use of slave labour in the fast fashion supply chains.

The power of television was reaffirmed in the millions of viewers reacting in horror to the nation’s consumption of plastic goods.

Nothing has been more effective in bringing home the environmental impact of plastics on the environment than footage of a sea turtle choking on a straw.

People will continue to go back and forth arguing whether fashion is the biggest polluter, whether it’s in first place on in the top five, the fact the industry, globally contributes more pollution than aircraft and sea vessels combined, is indicative of the scale of environmental damage we are dealing with.

The Environmental Audit Committee’s report that was released 19th February 2019, delivered some home truths that place the host of fast fashion retailers and manufactures who had been summoned to give evidence under the spotlight of public scrutiny.

After interrogating the decision makers for firms such as Boohoo, MisGuided, Sports Direct, ASOS, Marks and Spencers and a host of other high street brands, the EAC’s verdict has sent tremors through the industry.

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The opening line of the report declares that the current business model is ‘unsustainable’.

In her introduction, Mary Creagh MP, Chair of the EAC, declared:

“Our biggest retailers have chased the cheap needle around the planet”(EAC,2019) By commissioning production in countries with low pay, little trade union representation and weak environmental protection—the industry had essentially built it’s foundations on sinking sand. Eventually the consumer would grow a conscience, or, sickened by the excess and gluttony, grow fatigued from the churn and burn cycle of cheap consumption.

Unfortunately for these retailers, both eventualities have come to pass—simultaneously, leaving these sleeping giants vulnerable to the abrupt changes in consumer tastes.

We all witnessed the early signals before Christmas 2018 when ASOS posted a 40% drop in share price. A hiccup?

Or an early smoke signal. Later that day Boohoo and M&S also posted drop in their share prices too. Could be pure coincidence that these were the firms also hauled before the Parliamentary Committee for their use of plastics and dodgy supply chains tainted with slave labour?

One of the biggest shocks of 2018, came from the Financial Times report on slave labour in Leicester where workers were being paid below the minimum wage, while being forced to work in unsafe conditions.

“Fast Fashion’s over production and over consumption of clothing is based on the globalisation of indifference towards manual workers” (EAC,2019

The public’s startling realisation that the sweatshop fashion model is not just occurring in countries like Bangladesh, China and Taiwan, but here in the UK, has brought with it further cries for government intervention in order to hold these firms to account.

Cries for more data, more information and further transparency for consumers has been met with a wave of stats.

Here’s the highlights:

“More than $500 billion of value is lost every year due to clothing under utilisation and lack of recycling.”

Ellen MacArthur Foundation

What about Luxury?

One of the biggest lies the industry has promoted, has been the illusion that the luxury sector is exempt from the crimes committed by fast fashion retailers.

When it comes to incinerating excess stock, unsold items for the sake of ‘preserving brand value’ some of the worlds most respected fashion houses have led the way in this practice—thinking nothing of the environmental impact, or the social implications that they would sooner set fire to an unused item than donate it to homeless charities or to be recycled. >

#TSLReport “The garment industry is reportedly the world’s 3rd Then there’s the workforce. largest Last September's report from manufacturing the New York Times exposed Italian fashion houses exploitindustry after ing murky supply chains where automotive and tech factories outsourced labour to industries.” housewives, working away on Burberry was not the only one.

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According to the EAC’s report, the UK buys more clothes per person than any other country in Europe.

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Around 300,000 tonnes of textiles waster ends up in household black bins every year and is either sent to landfill or is incinerated.



Less than 1% of materials used to produce clothing is recycled into new clothing. Meanwhile retailers are burning new unsold stock merely to preserve their brand (Burberry received backlash in the media for engaging in this practice in August 2018)

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By 2030 global apparel consumption is projected to rise by 63% from 62 million tons today to 102 million tons—equivalent to 500 billion additional tshirts. (EAC, 2019)



In September 2015, the UK signed up to the UN Sustainable Development Goals including a commitment to ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns.

(EAC, 2019)

Max Mara coats for 1 Euro per metre.

These coats retail for over 2,000 Euros, the mark up is immoral. The fact that these women are often in search of employment to support their families means they are vulnerable. They are also often without representation, so without any unions—they have no voice in the midst of the corporate machines.

This follows the Bloomberg report earlier in the year exposing American luxury brands outsourcing their manufacturing to Chinese contractors who manufacture on their behalf in Ethiopia. The factory Hawassa Industrial Park, was found to pay it’s predominantly female workforce less than $30 a month, while forcing them to live in squalid conditions.

It appears luxury brands are also exploiting the fast fashion business model too.

Their prices no longer guarantee quality or ethics.

There is some progress being made by some luxury houses in an attempt to redeem their public image. Kering’s appointment of a Chief Sustainability Officer Marie Claire Daveux has seen a culture shift within the brand. Their support of the Ellen MacArthur foundation and the Global Fashion agenda’s commitment to transparent supply chains is being held as a paradigm to the rest of the industry.

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The question remains, at what rate will the rest of the industry follow?

The UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, singles out the fashion industry for it’s scale in covering global productivity, agriculture and employment. In the fight to eradicate poverty, it plays a key role Steve Steve Kenzie, Executive Director, UN Global Compact, explains.

The UK Government signed up to the UN’s Sustainable Development goals in 2015.

The next question? After all the reports and the statistics have been submitted, what will the government do next?

Facts & Figures 

The UN says that by 2050 the equivalent of THREE planets could be required to provide natural resources needed to sustain current lifestyles given to the growth in global population.



According to Mckinsey, the global apparel, fashion and luxury industry outperformed all other market indexes in profitability between 20032013—oustripping high growth sectors like technology and telecommunications.

#TSLReport What is the ‘Circular Economy’? “ *Design out waste. *Keep products and materials in use. *Regenerate natural In a circular economy, economic activity builds and rebuilds overall system health. The concept recognises the importance of the economy needing to work effectively at all scales – for large and small businesses, for organisations and individuals, globally and locally.

Transitioning to a circular economy does not only amount to adjustments aimed at reducing the negative impacts of the linear economy. Rather, it represents a systemic shift that builds long-term resilience, generates business and economic opportunities, and provides environmental and societal benefits.

Source: Ellen MacArthur Foundation

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The circular economy model synthesises several major schools of thought. They include the functional service economy (performance economy) of Walter Stahel; the Cradle to Cradle design philosophy of William McDonough and Michael Braungart; biomimicry as articulated by Janine Benyus; the industrial ecology of Reid Lifset and Thomas Graedel; natural capitalism by Amory and Hunter Lovins and Paul Hawken; and the blue economy systems approach described by Gunter Pauli.

“Government intervention is 'necessary’.

Innovative businesses and designers in the UK face competition from businesses who are focused on reducing costs and maximising profits regardless of the environmental social costs.”

(EAC, 2019)

EAC Recommendations

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

Moving from conventional to organic cotton and from virgin polyester to recycled P.E.T



The Government should investigate whether its proposed TAX on virgin plastics, which comes into force in 2022 should be applied to textiles products that contain less than 50% recycled P.E.T to stimulate the market for recycled fabrics.

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Economic incentives for retailers to do the right thing. Taxation reforms to reward fashion companies that design products with lower environmental impacts and penalise those who do not.

#TSLReport Other sources...

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Highlights

LONDON FASHION WEEK

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PHOEBE ENGLISH

SAUL NASH

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Highlights

CHRISTOPHER RAEBURN AW19

“Designers can only do so much. What we really need is for the government to put this on the curriculum.

The best way, the most effective way to change patterns of consumer consumption, is to bring the discussion about sustainability and the environment into the classrooms.�

Graeme Rarburn, Backstage, Chrstopher Raeburn Show LFWM AW19

London Fashion Week Mens The highlight of the weekend was the Christopher Raeburn show. Celebrating his new appointment as the creative director of Timberland, the long-term sustainable fashion advocate delivered a militant statement.

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Using upcycled/recycled materials Raeburn delivered an articulate demonstration that sustainable fashion was serious affair. It is the epitome of cool, and is what the environment and the industry needs right now.

The challenge is no longer designing new clothes, but demonstrating a level of dexterity that enables new things to be refashioned from the old.

#Interview

Priya Ahluwalia YJH: In terms of the motives behind using repurposed textiles. What was the vision for that?

PA: It was a long process.

Clothes from the west travels so far to developing countries. People wear it and they buy it from markets and things like that. I found that so interesting. I was really shocked by it.

Beyond it being an ethically big thing that there is so much waste in the world, I think it’s really interesting to take something that already exists and reformat it into something new. I think in terms of design I really enjoy that process. And I’m really interested in graphics so...

YJH: The business model, how does that work? Is it something that you do to order, how do you bring your products to market?

PA: I’m working on a small ready to wear business at the moment. Each garment that is patch worked is slightly different to each other, it will be the same shape and everything. It depends Portrait by Lawrence Ellis on what I can get my hands on. It’s a laborious task but it’s worth it. My clients will get some- YJH: obviously your model is not homogenous. In thing slightly different from each other. terms of your production process would you say you’re sustainable because you’re not bound to a particular type of fabric?

PA: The possibilities are endless. Because say if I wanted to do patchwork camouflage trousers, I could produce loads of patchwork camouflage.

What it does limit is the speed I can get things at or in terms of sourcing it makes it a long process. – So it’s lucky I enjoy it!

[End]

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Highlights

MARTA JAKUBOWSKI AW19

RYAN LO AW19 30

MOTHER OF PEARL SS19 Arguably the highlight of London Fashion Week for womenswear, the Mother of Pearl presentation challenged editors to participate. In order to get up close to the collection, the viewer was required to wade through a see of sustainably sourced plastic pearls.

Speaking to creative director Amy Powney, she explained that her objective was to use the pearls as visual demonstration of the current plastic situation in our seas. Watching grown women fall face first into a ball pit for grown ups was both entertaining and effective in getting the point across.

The facts and figures of fashion’s contribution to global pollution are well documented. But some how it’s impossible to ignore while standing surrounded by plastic pearls in the Fitzrovia Chapel. Yes the collection is beautiful, but if you lose your footing, you’re drowning in plastic ‘figuratively’. Mingling laughter with education is the least stressful way to broach the topic after multiple reports and documentaries on the topic.

Powney’s presentation comes just a week after the Parliamentary Audit Committee released their report on their findings following an audit of the UK fashion industry. Unfortunately, Amy informs me that she has been too busy to read it—(the build up to LFW is all consuming). But, she pauses, the only thing that makes a difference now will be government legislation. “Taxes. Levies. Ban imports that don’t meet requirements” Amy declares.

Mother of Pearl under her stewardship has seen a more vocal, unapologetic approach to reconciling sustainable fashion with luxury. Their newest No Frills collection sits where the high street meets luxury, with none of the fuss or fanfare.

The pearls? “Oh, they’ll be cleaned and recycled, and reused again.” Amy tells me. “It’s all part of the circular economy.” The buzzword of the yea, it seems. But, nothing in the Mother of Pearl presentation is there for mere idle vanity. Everything serves some purpose.

Transparency is the Mother of Pearl way.

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#Events

Future Fabric Expo London 24th-25th January

Fashion has a future.

After the fire and brimstone that 2018 unleashed with heightened levels of press scrutiny into the modern day slavery, pollution and excess of the fashion industry, I am pleased to announce that 2019 brings with it a more conciliatory and positive outlook for the sector.

After witnessing the progress at London Fashion Week Mens at the start of this month, it is safe to say, among the New Gen of designers, sustainability is at the very core of their design philosophy. Ethical fashion is more than a passing trend. It is the future of fashion.

The concept of ethical fashion and eco fashion is not new. The UK has a long history of producing ethical entrepreneurs, from Josiah Wedgewood, to Katherine Hamnett and Anita Roddick (founder of the BodyShop). While the rest of the world cottons onto veganism and wellness, in a quiet pocket of UK industry there has always been an agitator, a reformer working for change.

So, it came as no surprise when I sat down with Nina Marenzi, the founder of the Sustainable Angle, that she explained that her journey began with her dissertation project at Imperial College, London

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. ‘Organic Cotton: Reasons Why the Fashion Industry is Dragging its Heels’ was the title of Marenzi’s dissertation for her MSc in Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development.

In order to complete this project she was required to interview numerous fashion designers, representatives of the textiles manufacturing industry and NGOs. Her research uncovered a desperate need for a curated sustainable textiles showcase.

A lack of awareness, Marenzi explains, was the biggest hinderance to evolution in fashion’s manufacturing processes. Thus, the Future Fabrics Expo was created. In 2010, Marenzi established The Sustainable Angle in order to initiate and support projects aimed at reducing the environmental impact of the industry.

The Sustainable Angle is both a platform for independent manufacturers and a solution provider for designers with a growing conscience in all matters concerning sustainability and conservation. Many stare in wonder at the plummeting share prices of the UK’s fast fashion high street brands, but it is no coincidence.

As government legislation begins to flex it’s muscles addressing the plastic problem and

#Events pollution, brands who have contributed to the growing problems, find themselves in a PR nightmare. A succession of reports from the Financial Times and the Global Slavery Index 2018, sent ricochets through the industry as the reality of the fashion industry’s involvement in modern day slavery and child labour, has left many unable to return to their previous positions of complacency.

Revolution (not reform) – is the only alternative. So it seems that at the precise moment the industry pivots towards rhetoric around sustainable fashion and conservation, an organisation dedicated to this very cause stands ready, waiting, with open arms.

Apple-leather, recycled wood chips transformed into a cotton substitute, bio-degradable sequins and recycled polyester were just a handful of the sample materials on display at the press preview for the Future Fabrics Expo 2019. Attached to each sample was a label, giving the reader a brief synopsis of the composition, it’s environmental features, and contact details of the factory that manufactures it.

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I have always maintained that for fashion to be ‘Fashion’ it must also be functional. Anything else is idle vanity. With the in depth research The Sustainable Angle does, in bringing the latest innovations to the market, designers have an opportunity to create something that is both aesthetically pleasing that does not harm the environment, the farmers or the local economies that support the industry.

Fashion must never again be separated from its manufacturing and agricultural roots.

With the fast fashion epidemic, it became detached under a ‘See Now, Buy Now’ frenzy of mass consumption. The end result is landfill waste, micro plastics and polluted water systems.

Sustainability is about survival, not just of a particular economic sector, but of life on Earth itself. If the fashion industry is to survive it must first evolve. The key to this evolution? (I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it again) People first, profit later.

The Future Fabrics Expo was held at Victoria House, Bloomsbury Square, London, 24th-25th January.

#Events

#PowerofOne Pure London AW19 (10h Feb-12th Feb 2019) Kensington, London There was an air of seriousness that hung over the stalls at the Sunday instalment of the Pure London 2019AW show at Kensington Olympia. After a bruising year from the media and governments around the world, chastising the fashion industry for its profligacy and contribution to pollution and poverty, the marketers seemed eager to show the visitors they had listened to the constructive criticism.

The #PowerofOne campaign was brought front and centre with all staff members wearing the t-shirts. The billboards announced the presence of the UN and their Global Goals initiative. The Pure Origin exhibit has grown with even more manufacturers from around the world, eager to meet their

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prospective clients face to face. Increasingly more strive to offer better deals on minimum orders, eager to champion their low carbon footprints and demonstrate how their products are locally and ethically sourced.

If transparency and dialogue is the objective, the organisers have fulfilled their brief. Last year’s collaboration with Orsola de Castro, co founder of Fashion Revolution, in the foundation of the Pure Origin Exhibit, is paying dividends.

There is even a designated ‘Conscious fashion’ area for the vegan, recycled plastics and ethical lifestyle brands.

Cont>

#Events

Steve Kenzie, Executive Director, UN Global Compact

By making it easier for consumers and buyers to find sustainable high quality brands, and giving better platforms for ethical manufacturers is evidently, it is clear this is now a top priority.

Last year the EDB (Economic Development Bank) had a prominent presence supporting the delegation of factories from Mauritius, this year the Serbian Chambers of Commerce assisted local factories in making the journey to London to source new business. There seems to be growing and healthy competition between the various countries in attendance.

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United Nations Sustainable Development Goals Steve Kenzie, Executive Director, United Nations Global Compact, gave the opening address. It was a watershed moment to have the presence of the UN at a London, B2B fashion trade show. Mr. Kenzie did little to disguise his disappointment that the world, is still so far away from getting issues such as pollution, poverty and climate change under control. He intimated that fashion is a key player in this project. One in six jobs around the world are created by the fashion industry, according to UN statistics.

#Events From the cotton fields to the factory floor, from the tanneries to the design studios: as one of the biggest employers, fashion is also one of the largest industries that uses the most natural resources – and thus one of the biggest polluters. Mr. Kenzie wished not to chastise the independent wholesalers, buyers and consumers in the audience but to educate them on the #PowerofOne. The power they each held, in adopting more sustainable practices to improve their surroundings.

Employment. Productivity. Social mobility.

Economic Growth – these are all areas that the fashion industry has the potential to facilitate in every economy it is active. Among food and shelter, clothing is the third basic need for humanity’s survival.

Fashion isn’t going anywhere, but it feels like for the first time, from the consumer all the way to the UN, there is an acceptance, that the fashion industry needs sweeping reforms.

During her panel talk, the trailblazing activist and designer Katherine Hamnett did not mince her words. “I’ve read the Interim report from the Parliamentary Audit Committee,” she announced. “But all it tells me, is just how little our government understands fashion.” During our conversation, I raised her point again, asking her for clarification.

“They refer to ‘textiles’ throughout, but the firms they summoned (Asos, Primark, TK Maxx, Debenhams, M&S) are retailers. Textiles, by definition refers to the process, not the finished product.”

My mouth fell open.

I had previously cheered when the public statement from the committee announced that they were in agreement that the fast fashion business model was ‘unsustainable’. No one, had clocked that this was report was essentially window dressing.

What I hadn’t considered until now, was the reality that this audit, did not probe far enough.

What of the individual factories that supplied these firms? Had they investigated the chemicals used, the processes in which the materials were sourced?

Hamnett, with her unflinching stare confirmed – that the government’s ignorance in the fundamentals in fashion had led to this oversight. “They talk about the fishing industry all the time in the Commons, but that industry is worth £1.9 billion, the fashion industry more like £34 billion – but it’s barely given a second thought.”

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Phase One was about consciousness, making people aware of the high price the world is paying for a lifestyle that is built on inefficiency and waste. Phase Two? Legislation? External pressures on corporations and countries that do not accelerate the necessary reforms at a fast enough rate?

Hamnett proposed utilising the trading bloc’s muscle in only importing goods that meet the sustainable goals standard in manufacturing.

When asked how, as a team member, an individual could they get their CEOs to care?

“Unionise” was her response. Talk is cheap.

Now it’s time to act. While some speak of reform, Hamnett’s language was all about revolution. Starting again, innovating new business models, exploring new methods of sustainable manufacturing. #ThePowerOfOne is as much about the agency of the individual as it is the collective. It speaks of accountability of the manufacturer, the wholesaler, the buyer, the retailer and the consumer – the CEO and the employee. Governments are appointed by the people. The Csuite only exists when corporations have a customer base and demand. Consumers really do, for the first time hold all the cards in maintaining pressure for genuine and sustainable change. The question for 2019, is can these brands and corporations adapt fast enough to the shifts in consumer tastes?

[End]

#Events

Katherine Hamnett, Pure London AW2019, Kensington Olympia, photographed by Yasmin Jones-Henry

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CHAMPIONING ETHICAL FASHION FOR 30+ YEARS

KATHERINE HAMNETT LONDON 38

#Events

INTERNATIONAL FASHION SHOWCASE (11th Feb-24th Feb 2019) Somerset House, London Review by Yasmin Jones-Henry

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#Events In November 2016, when I published my first ever article “Functionality vs The Aesthetic” on @Workinfashion.me, I had just one simple question: WHAT IS FASHION FOR? I had to ask, because back then, looking at the state of the industry, it wasn’t entirely clear.

As a millennial growing up in a decade of rabid consumption and fast fashion, I relied upon my parents’ perspective, to inform my tastes in the aesthetic.

My mother taught me that fashion was political. As a form of self expression, I was conditioned to believe that there is no trend that you’re obligated to follow. My father – ever the social entrepreneur used to scold me with the phrase “You buy cheap, you buy twice” as he implored me to consider the human cost of my fast fashion choices aged 14. But, in truth, without them, I would have been at a loss.

Somewhere in between Katherine Hamnett’s epic declaration to “Bring Back God” and the “See Now, Buy Now” trend that infected the catwalk, I felt that fashion had lost its way. As a woman of colour, I have very little recollection of seeing any form of diversity in my favourite glossies growing up. It was just the way things were. But, the moon travels in phases, the seasons have their cycle and we seem to be coming back to the middle. Fashion has finally rediscovered its focus.

Bold, Unapologetic and Sincere are the three words I would use to describe the International Fashion Showcase’s ‘Brave New Worlds’ exhibition. The IFS is a collaboration between the British Council, British Fashion Council and London College of Fashion. The International Fashion Showcase, held at Somerset House, first inaugurated in 2012 as part of the Cultural Olympiad.

In 2018 it evolved into a creative mentoring and business support residency for emerging designers.

The objective was to give these young, international designers the opportunity to build a network of peers and professional contacts in the British fashion industry.

The International Fashion Showcase is commissioned by Sarah Mann (Director of Architecture, Design, Fashion, British Council)

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Caroline Rush CBE (Chief Executive, British Fashion Council), Prof. Frances Corner OBE (Head of London College of Fashion UAL) and Ceri Hand (Director of Programmes, Somerset House).

The chair of the International Fashion Showcase is none other than Sarah Mower MBE (British Fashion Council Ambassador for Emerging Talent). For those of you who have read Platforms & Protégés (2017)you will know that I’m a big fan of Sarah Mower. She’s a woman of substance. So, anything that has her name attached to it will not disappoint.

Imagine the #SarahsList exhibit at Liberty’s London back in 2017 – then project that onto a global scale, with designers from Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Georgia, India, Italy, Kenya, Lebanon, Lithuania, Netherlands, Rwanda, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Uruguay and Vietnam. Young designers: big platforms.

Interview with Sarah Mower featured in the #Workinfashion50 (Photograph courtesy of the British Fashion Council)

Walking through the Brave New Worlds exhibit, I turned to Sarah and declared, “You’re an International Mama!” She laughed, but I know she knew what I meant. I had seen the exhibit twice in one day. The press preview in the morning, and the launch party in the evening.

[Cont]

#Events Mingling with the designers, talking to them about their work, their local communities and how they were enjoying London, it’s not until you mention Sarah’s name that their eyes light up.

Talking to Roni Helou, a Lebanese designer and social entrepreneur whose exhibit chastised the viewer for the environmental cost of fashion, he simply smiled and said “Sarah’s amazing”. It meant so much for these independent artisans to know, that despite being in far flung corners of the world, somewhere in London, is a safe space, where they are permitted to speak their truth, through their art.

In “Functionality vs The Aesthetic”, I deduced that real fashion – for it to be fashion – must serve a purpose, anything else is idle vanity.

These designers seem to share the same view.

Each installation tells a different story. From the Netherlands, in Duran Lantink’s decimated department store, we see a foreboding of the demise of consumerism.

Meanwhile India’s Naushad Ali, makes the powerful statement using upcycled materials to illustrate how ‘One man’s trash is another man’s treasure’.

Sarah with Roni Helou, Lebanese designer 11/02/2019 (photographed by YJH)

Naushad Ali photographed by © Agnese Sanvito

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#Events

Thebe Magugu, South African designer, photographed by Agnese Sanvito

Few could find space to manoeuvre in Thebe Magugu’s room as he channelled the activism of the South African school girls who challenged the constitution as they fought for the right to wear their natural, unstraightened hair to school. His sharp tailoring, eye for colour and detail, was complimented with the Afros as the ultimate symbol of black resistance.

I promised myself, that I wouldn’t walk you through every installation, because you all need to go and see this for yourself. It seemed fitting, that the day after interviewing Katherine Hamnett,

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fashion designer, activist and all round legend, that I would then have the privilege of seeing the next generation of designers who understand their responsibility in using their creative power for the betterment of the human race. The revolution is upon us, and it’s gone global.

[END] **After winning the International Fashion Showcase Award, Thebe Magugu has now been shortlisted for the LVMH Prize 2019.**

SPRING IS COMING...

HERE ARE SOME OF THE SUSTAINABLE BRANDS WE LOVE.

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ZII ROPA

Enter: 85XWIF at checkout to receive 15% discount. www.85Paris.com

Zii Ropa was born in the desert of Baja California Sur, Mexico, where the Vancouverite creative director settled to develop a design studio based on the principles of longevity, art and balance.

The line uses natural fibre fabrics to create minimal modern silhouettes inspired by muted landscapes and soft textures.

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The clothing studio evolves around the principle of finding what empowers a woman and makes her feel good, comfortable and style driven.

Each piece is hand-tailored in small women-run workshops and an in-house studio in the Roma and Condesa Districts of Mexico City. MADE IN MEXICO

AYNI A Peruvian brand that specialises in ethically sourced knitwear.

The ‘fabiana’ Jacket (left) is made from the Peruvian alpaca, it is hand knitted by communities in the Cuzco region in Peru, under ethical conditions.

Enter: 85XWIF at checkout to receive 15% discount. www.85Paris.com

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Laura Ironside Studio 46

S DRESS WWW.SDRESS.COM 47

Enter: 85XWIF at checkout to receive 15% discount. www.85Paris.com

CARALARGA 48

Everlane

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Paradise Row www.paradiserowlondon.com/

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Heritier Freres

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©2019 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED URBAN FLOW DESIGNS LTD

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