Pop the Cork

WORDS Bruce Nelson PHOTOS Liza Spratt

LABEL - Fashion & Accessories

A passion to provide a unique yet environmentally friendly and sustainable fashion accessory and homewares range prompted Liza Spratt to look to the Iberian Peninsula for inspiration.

Cork doesn’t immediately conjure up tote bags and fruit bowls, rather the natural and self-renewable product is best known for wine bottle stoppers, gaskets and floor tiles used in the 1970s.

However its beautiful and malleable texture has recently lent itself to a range of accessories and products that are on-trend with our obsession with social and environmental responsibility and fashion statement pieces to boot.

Cork Trader, a company founded by Liza Spratt to showcase the distinctive material, was created to provide a different sustainable designer product that wasn’t available in every fashion store.

Selling stylish European designed handbags, back packs, wallets, purses and a range of homewares, Liza searches for the very best products produced by skilled artisans and showcases them to a new Australian market.

“I have a background in retail and interior design, so when I came across cork I knew immediately it provided all the necessary qualities that not only make it unique, but aligned with our increasing environmental consciousness as well,” she says.

“You don’t see cork fashion products that much here, and while they are more prevalent in Europe, I don’t import the same as the tourist cork you see on the streets of Lisbon.

“Ultimately cork is a fashion statement that says, ‘I’m stylish, different and I care about the environment’ and that’s something you won’t find in a single product anywhere except for cork.”

Cork is harvested from Quercus suber, the cork oak, which is found mostly in southwest Europe and northwest Africa where it is one of the major plant communities of the Mediterranean woodlands and forests ecoregion.

The bark of the tree is water-resistant, buoyant, elastic, and fire retardant, and is removed only from early May to late August when it can be separated from the tree without causing permanent damage.

Ironically once harvested it promotes new growth and the trees end up living longer, up to 300 years, making it one of the most renewable natural products on the planet.

“As a resource for use in fashion and accessories cork is about as natural as you can get,” says Liza.

“Cork Trader’s range doesn’t use any animal products and is ethically made using only sustainably-sourced materials.

“Our best seller is the shopper bag; after all if you really care about the environment why not carry one made of cork instead of plastic or a recycled product that requires some degree of manufacture?

“They’re beautiful to look at and fantastic to feel which together create something wonderful and unique.”

Cork Trader 0418 882 092

Instagram @corktrader