9 Posts  •  September 27, 2010  •  WPBundle

Sustainable chic hits capital of fashion

Tomorrow the carousels at Charles de Gaulle airport will be filled with designer suitcases as the world’s fashion press descend for Paris fashion week – but this weekend a very different showcase opened in the French capital. The Ethical Fashion Show, the world’s largest event devoted solely to sustainable fashion, is now in its seventh year and becoming increasingly mainstream: there are over a hundred brands represented, and the show has outgrown its humble origins in disused warehouses to occupy the new Docks en Seine building, home of the French Fashion Institute.

You’ve killed me! Oh, you’ve killed me! Isn’t it true that you have been paid for your testimony? I could if you hadn’t turned on the light and shut off my stereo. Son, as your lawyer, I declare y’all are in a 12-piece bucket o’ trouble. But I done struck you a deal: Five hours of community service cleanin’ up that ol’ mess you caused. Bender! Ship! Stop bickering or I’m going to come back there and change your opinions manually!

But with the blast shield down, I can’t even see!

This year the show has been taken over by Messe Frankfurt, the world’s largest trade show organiser – a sign that despite the recession, ethical fashion is still a growth market. “It’s become more professional, it looks a lot more like a trade show now,” said Gilles Richard of childrenswear brand La Queue du Chat, who have been exhibiting here for four years.

Several brands from Britain have also made the trip. Sarah Ratty of Ciel, who was showcasing a stunning new digital print, colour-fixed with algae, said she had been lured here for the first time by the involvement of Messe Frankfurt. “It’s really nice to be able to have a platform abroad to showcase great British design with a green twist,” she said.

Other highlights included an ingenious dress by Danish company Diffus, embedded with tiny lights that visibly react to the CO2 levels in the environment around it. Celebrating the UN’s Year of Biodiversity, there is also a particular focus on sustainable fabrics, including loose-knit scarfs and jumpers made from nettle, pineapple and super-soft banana fibres.

Ethical fashion is increasingly moving into the limelight – Mintel estimates that despite the recession the market has more than quadrupled in the last five years, to around £175 million in the UK alone. Last week saw the first sustainable fashion show at London fashion week, as well as a vibrant and busy Estethica showcase. But the organisers of this show are determined to make Paris the capital of ethical fashion – as well as couture and pret-a-porter.

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Author: WPBundle

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  1. Reply WPBundle

    Spare me your space age technobabble, Attila the Hun! What’s with you kids? Every other day it’s food, food, food. [pause] Alright, I’ll get you some stupid food. What are you hacking off? Is it my torso?! ‘It is!’ My precious torso!

    12th November 2010

  2. Reply Liam McKay

    Fireworks it’s the best application for web design. It’s more faster, easy layers management, and the selections of objects, text modifications, gradients and colours are very very more faster and easy than photoshop. Photoshop is not the best program for manage big number of layers or independent objects…

    12th November 2010

  3. Reply WPBundle

    Far from being useless, Boris, I think this article provides a really interesting perspective on usability testing

    I especially like the somewhat unorthodox “what if” suggestions, and the point that the “hard way” may actually have some perceived advantage for the user. Perhaps the same old usability guidelines, reiterated over and over, actually limit our thinking – and limited thinking is a main cause of bad usability!

    12th November 2010

  4. Reply Steve Avery

    Ah yes. I can remember our first lesson in typography. The prof gave us straight orders: “Don’t even try to calculate something! Get a calculator! If you write something, ask somebody to correct it! Half of you are dyslexics and the rest doesn’t even know what a prime number is! But don’t worry – that’s why you want to become designers.”

    12th November 2010

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