SUSTAINABLE TEXTILES. ECO-FASHION DESIGN. CIRCULAR ECONOMY.
The Sustainable Fashion Centre (SFC) will launch first in Sydney in early 2019 and will unite sustainable textile makers and artisans from India with emerging and established fashion designers to collaborate through the lens of design, fabric and fashion, plus educate around the principles of a circular economy.
SFC has partnered with strategic sustainable fashion and circular economy players plus is working in collaboration with the Australian Fashion Council with the focus on creating beautiful contemporary fashion made with sustainable textiles plus offer closed loop strategies along the entire supply chain.
This multifaceted Centre is created by Alison Jose of the Sustainable Textile Supply Chain (STSC) and is structured as a commercial business and social enterprise offering retail, wholesale and key consulting services. The Centre will be a space for talks, events and workshops plus the Sustainable Fashion Centre Collection Bank in collaboration with repair, recycle and upcycle clothing initiatives.
The Centre will feature curated collections showcasing fashion designers using sustainable textiles, offer consulting services for designers wanting to collaborate with Indian Artisans, sell wholesale sustainable textiles, stage talks and workshops around fashion and the circular economy, plus become a crucial drop-off location for used clothing that is then repaired, recycled and upcycled to follow our circular economy principles.
RETAIL. CONTEMPORARY FASHION
The Centre will sell retail contemporary fashion by emerging, established and international designers who work with sustainable textiles throughout one to three-monthly Capsule Collection Showcases plus hold sample stock for on-going sales. Curated Showcases will sell designers’ apparel and accessories under a united theme; such as all designers using the same eco-fabric; or garments featuring Artisan skills or circular fashion themes.
Examples include the inaugural BLACK BANANA SYLK showcase, where 10-20 invited designers will be gifted black Banana Sylk fabric to create unique pieces; a SHIBORI Showcase exploring the shibori dyeing method using sustainable textiles employing Indian artisan skills, both RECYCLED and UPCYCLED fashion Showcases, plus showcases with key collaborators such as University Honour Student final year collections – request separate Showcase Schedule document.
In addition to SFC seeking sponsorship and funding, we look to secure Showcase sponsorship for each session to cover expenses such as the fabric for designers to create their Capsule Collections.
One of the barriers to market, especially for emerging designers is the expense to purchase fabric in full a long time in advance to be able to create the garments. The Centre aims to ease this burden by securing sponsorship and gift the fabric to designers in advance, such as in February to gift fabric to University fashion students wanting to use sustainable textiles for their final Honour collections, which are then exhibited at the Centre at the end of the year.
request Appendix 1. Draft SFC Showcase Schedule.
WHOLESALE. SUSTAINABLE TEXTILES.
STSC. Sustainable Textile Supply Chain STSC are fabric wholesalers who aim to inspire global fashion and product designers to use true sustainable eco-textiles that have minimal negative impact on the environment and maximum impact on the welfare of all people along the supply chain.
Our particular focus is on beautiful, truly sustainable, biodegradable natural plant fabrics made from so-called "waste" fibres that are removed after a farmer’s harvest, thus creating fabrics that start from zero water waste, and support the "Wealth From Waste" philosophy. STSC aims to support farming communities who currently pay to have their crop waste removed, which is also often burnt, adding to local air pollution.
We wholesale Natural Sylk fabric made from banana stem fibres, aloe vera leaves, rose petals, corn, milk protein, and soy beans. The 100% Banana Sylk is made from the banana plant's finest pseudo stem fibres, it is organic, biodegradable, durable and picks up our eco GOTS dyes and pure plant dyes with outstanding colour depth to additionally minimise water waste.
The fabric is silk-grade, luxuriously soft, more breathable, plus less water-consumptive and more environmentally sustainable than other natural fibre including organic cotton, silk, hemp and bamboo.
STSC sells hybrid eco-blends of 70% Organic Cotton blended with a choice of 30% banana fibre or aloe vera fibre.
We wholesale beautiful ethically sourced Peace Silks; Eri Silk, Tussar Silk and Gajji Silk, all made from silk worm cocoons where the silk worms have evacuated naturally and have not been boiled alive and then chemically treated like traditional silk.
We support cotton farmers who move over to organic crops and sell both Fairtrade Organic Cotton, Organic cotton and Recycled Cotton blends. Our Mill is the first manufacturers in South India to recycle cotton yarn into fabrics using Ringspun. They use 30% post-consumer waste and pre-consumer knitted garments cut waste and mix with 70% virgin Organic Cotton.
We sell handloomed organic cotton such as Organic Cotton Khadi that is both hand spun and hand loomed with GOTS certification. Plus unique Ayurvastra organic cotton fabric that is hand dyed plus infused with up to 108 medicinal herbs. This cloth carries on the 5,000 year-old Indian natural medical practice known as Ayurveda, which is known as a sister science to yoga and meditation.
STSC wholesales the highest accredited world-renowned closed-loop eco-fabrics direct from the Austrian developers LENZING™ who create cellulosic yarns derived from wood pulp including Tencel™, Tencel™ LUXE, and their newest, and most environmentally sustainable and biodegradable yarns, ECOVERO™ and REFIBRA™. We are also in the process of arranging Lenzing Footwear.
To complete Lenzing’s sustainable supply chain, STSC have selected several commercial mills in India who use some of the most advanced biological water waste treatment and conservation systems brought from Italy.
STSC also ensures that we only wholesale fabrics that are either dyed using GOTS accredited low-toxic dyes or textiles that are hand dyed using pure plant-based dyes dyed; addressing our key concerns of water conservation and clean water preservation in our supply chains.
Please request a copy of the STSC SUSTAINABLE TEXTILE BOOK outlining over forty sustainable textiles for your information.
STSC’s goal is to create a booming sustainable fabric industry that will support families, particularly farmers and women Artisans in India. Businesses supported range from women working from home, through to professionally accredited large production houses.
STSC work with the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University's Eco Green Unit who have developed an improved Fibre Extraction Machine, and along with additional support from Prime Minister Modi's Make In India initiative, the Eco Green Unit offer subsidies to farmers and communities to help them purchase machines and receive training.
STSC work to raise funds to purchase and gift Fibre Extraction Machines to farming communities. The first of these machines is set to be gifted to the Handloom Weavers Development Society, and Alison’s Mother-In-Law Pushpamma Sebastian who lives close in Kerala, South India. The Society has been running for 13 years and “works to improve the welfare of deprived, marginalised and downtrodden handloom weaving communities in Kerala. The Society also works to overcome gender issues through women empowerment programs”.
Alison’s aim is to help increase their manufacturing plus experiment on extracting pineapple leaf fibres and send to STSC’s fabric manufacturers to make the world’s cellulose first Pineapple Sylk.
The Centre will house a permanent exhibition of wholesale sustainable eco-textiles through STSC. Customers can purchase sample books plus order fabrics direct. STSC has also set up, so far, eight Sustainable Textile Clubs worldwide that offers emerging designers the opportunity to purchase fabrics at low Minimum Order Quantities; a problem that often causes designers to not use or be able to afford sustainable textiles.
Also through STSC Alison Jose and her 9 year-old-son are set to film a series of mini-documentaries as part of the set-up for the Centre. Along with documentary filmmaker Siobhán Costigan the series covers specific stories along their upcoming R&D trip to India and is titled The Fabric of Society. Creating A Sustainable Textile Industry and will serve as education on the Indian sustainable textile industry. www.siobhancostigan.com
Appendix 2. Documentary Brief. “The Fabric of Society. Creating A Sustainable Textile Industry”.
CIRCULAR CONSULTING SERVICES.
SFC offer sustainable and circular economy consulting services and have partnered with the following:
CELINE MASSA. ETHICAL CONSULTING
Celine Massa offers Ethical Consulting service to clients requiring Environmental and Social Impact Assessment and Guidance.
In a contemporary ethical fashion industry context, Celine Massa brings over ten years of experience working with NGO's, social organisations plus start-ups and most recently, over five years developing, implementing and overseeing Good On You's rating process which has led to rating over a thousand fashion brands.
By collaborating with the SFC, Celine offers an Ethical Consulting service to clients requesting Environmental and Social Impact Assessment and Guidance.
Celine has a background in environmental management and community development, along with a wide range of experience managing social impact projects, stakeholder engagement and in-running campaigns. Celine is particularly passionate about activating social change and treading more lightly on our planet.
Through the STSC Celine offers Ethical Consulting services to help create sustainable and ethical practices for forward-thinking apparel brands.
Celine works with clients to investigate current practices to see how they impact on people and the planet. This service involves assessing an entire supply chain from the raw materials stage, the input stage, to the cut-make-trim stage and include all suppliers within the journey. Together Celine will work to identify what sustainable and positive labour changes can be made which are viable and appropriate to a client’s situation.
The assessment covers materials and products, suppliers and their practices, energy usage and conservation, energy sources, procurement practices, transportation, packaging, waste and by-products, water usage and social responsibility.
ALISON JOSE, STSC. SUSTAINABLE TEXTILE SUPPLY CHAIN
Alison Jose of STSC consults on made-to-order and bespoke fashion production using sustainable textiles and practices.
TONY RALLIS, KING COTTON
Tony Rallis of King Cotton and the Clothing CleanUp will manage the Sustainable Fashion Centre Collection Bank housed at the Centre location. We will also cross-promote with the Clothing CleanUp – a public pick-up service, plus hopefully encourage Councils and businesses to work with SFC to install bins around Sydney.
This enables the SFC to actively promote the importance the public play in a circular economy by educating on how to donate clothes correctly to ensure they are repaired and recycled and keep textiles out of landfill.
Details on the Clothing CleanUp success story and the distribution chain used for second hand clothing The Clothing CleanUp Partnership.
For further information on the Sustainable Fashion Centre, contact Alison Jose.
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