Fashion News – Malin Viola Wennberg

No More Fur

Malin Viola Wennberg — Sat, 14 Oct 2017 08:27:38 +0000

Gucci faux fur A/W 17

This week Gucci joined the already large group of fashion brands who boycotts fur. During the 2017 Kering Talk at London Collage of Fashion last Wednesday CEO Marco Bizzarri introduced the company’s new fur-free policy. Bizzarri said: “Being socially responsible is one of Gucci’s core values, and we will continue to strive to do better for the environment and animals. With the help of HSUS and LAV, Gucci is excited to take this next step and hopes it will help inspire innovation and raise awareness, changing the luxury fashion industry for the better.” This new policy will be implemented from the spring/summer 2018 collection. According to Business of Fashion Bizzarri says fur products are worth about €10 million annually and will be replaced with products made of faux-fur, wool and new fabric innovations. Creative director Alessandro Michele partook in the decision-making process and emphasized that fur is no longer modern.

With this action Gucci joins many other leading fashion brands and retailers in going fur-free including Armani, Calvin Klein, HUGO BOSS, Net-a-Porter, Ralph Lauren and Stella McCartney. Stella McCartney even claims to be the fully vegetarian. “We are the world’s first and only vegetarian luxury brand. We do not think that any animal should give their life for the sake of fashion. We do not use and have never used leather, skins, feathers or fur in any of our products, collaborations or licensed products. This is a decision that we stand behind both ethically and environmentally.” Swedish fashion brand BACK, with creative director Ann-Sofie Back, is another example of a vegetarian fashion brand. No animal products are used in their collections and the office at Södermalm in Stockholm is completely meat free.

The reasons for going fur-free are not only linked to animal cruelty. The meat and leather industry is responsible for emitting 18% of manmade greenhouse gases in the world, which is even more than the share for all transportation. Moreover there’s the question about land and water usage in driving up cattle, as well as methane emission. In recent reports from United States Environmental Protection Agency., presented in documentary “Cowspiracy”, US methane emission from livestock is nearly equal to natural gas emission. To conclude, there are lots of reasons not to wear fur or leather. By banning fur the fashion houses and retailers are making the decision easier for consumers. A step in the right direction!

Rag & Bone joins Denim Recycling Program

Malin Viola Wennberg — Tue, 10 Oct 2017 08:55:23 +0000

American denim brand Rag & Bones join forces with recycling program Blue Jeans Go Green. Starting today October 10^th customers can hand in their old denim at any Rag & Bone store and receive 20% off a new pair of any full-price jeans that same day. The offer is valid October 10^th through December 31 this year.

Picture by Rag & Bone

The Blue Jeans Go Green program is a project that collects denim all over the US and recycles it into UltraTouch^TM Denim Insulation. The program started in 2006 as a part of Cotton Incorporated in an effort to keep textiles out of landfill and help American communities in need with housing. According to the Blue Jeans Go Green program it takes roughly 500 to 1,000 pairs of jeans to create enough insulation (approximately 200 square meter) for one average-sized home in the US. To this day the program has already collected 24 000 pieces of denim. Several American clothing brands have already joined the program, for example Madewell, J. Crew and Abercrombie & Fitch. Furthermore, 56 American collages and universities have also joined in by collecting denim on campus.

Picture by Rag & Bone

According to WWD, Marcus Wainwright, CEO, founder and creative director of Rag & Bone, said, “Now, more so than ever, each and every one of us has a responsibility to do our part to protect our environment. The Blue Jeans Go Green Initiative is making great strides in helping brands make a difference and we are honored to be launching this Denim Recycling Program. Honestly, I am intrigued to see if any unwanted Rag & Bone jeans are dropped off, but either way, it is a step in the right direction for our brand.”

Green Carpet Fashion Award – Made in Italy?

Malin Viola Wennberg — Mon, 25 Sep 2017 15:08:17 +0000

Photo by Eco-Age

Yesterday night the Green Carpets Fashion Award was held in Milan. The gala coincided with the last day of Milan Fashion Week and was held at the glamorous La Scala opera house. This award gala is the brainchild of Livia Firth’s Consultant agency Eco-Age and Camera Nazionale della Moda Italiana (CNMI), aiming to highlight Italian craftsmanship and supply chain. During the night 11 awards were handed out “…to a range of mills, artisans, emerging designers and brands, in recognition of their achievements in areas from environmental and social stewardship, to the preservation of Italian heritage and crafts, and celebration of “Made in Italy”. All awardees are either from Italy, or strongly involved in the Italian supply chain.”

Italian Fashion and craftsmanship has long been synonymous with luxury and quality, but what does “Made in Italy” really stand for today? According to Italian law a product needs to be planned, produced and packed in Italy to achieve the label “Made in Italy”, but can we really trust that labeling? The day before the Green Carpet Fashion Award Gala the site Business of Fashion published an article titled “Can an Award Show Solve Fashion’s Sustainability Challenge?”. The article points out the obvious flaws in blindly celebrating “Made in Italy”. Undoubtedly, supply chain transparency remains a key issue. “There is absolutely no transparency in the luxury industry as to how much is really made in Italy, or perhaps made in Eastern Europe and finished in Italy. That’s a massive issue in the industry. Made in Italy is an example of best practice — it’s just that there isn’t much of it anymore,” says Orsola de Castro, co-founder and creative director of Fashion Revolution.

The seamstresses of Maison Valentino

Nevertheless, Livia Firth wants to change this attitude and argues that we need to shine light on the workers, or the handprint as she calls it. “What we call the handprint of fashion is hugely important — once we start putting producers again on the front stage and make them work in partnership with designers, we will have achieved huge results.” This idea is specially reflected in one of the 11 awards titled “The Art of Craftsmanship”, which this year was handed to the seamstresses of Maison Valentino, presented by Annie Lennox. Find the full list of winners here.

NK Talks: Who Owns Fashion?

Malin Viola Wennberg — Mon, 18 Sep 2017 09:35:23 +0000

NK Talks

Last Friday, the 15^th of September, NK in Stockholm and Gothenburg invited the public to a conversation on trends, sustainability, innovation and ownership within the fashion industry. The conversation series is called “NK Talks” and stretches from the 15^th of September to the 30^th of September. Amongst others we will see Kristina Tjäder, Head of Design and Founder of House of Dagmar, Niklas Berglind, Stylist and Head of Fashion at Metro Mode and Frida Bard, Head of Design at HOPE. If you haven’t already, sign up here.

At the first talk for this season Elin Frendberg from The Swedish Fashion Council moderated the conversation on sustainability and ownership. Guests of the evening were Frida Bard, Head of Design at HOPE, Robert Rydberg, Stylist and Editor-in-Chief as well as Elin Larsson, Sustainability Manager at Filippa K. When asked, “who owns fashion?” all three of them agreed that brands and designers no longer dictated the streets. Today’s industry can be seen as a give-and-take relationship between the consumer and producer. What we see on the runway is wearable. This is also one of the reasons why see-now-buy-now is taking more ground. The fashion consumer of today is an informed consumer who makes quick decision and creates his or her own hype. Brands cannot afford to wait six months before releasing their collections.

Clothing Brush – Filippa K

Now that consumers can be seen as trendsetters themselves and fashion in some ways is democratized, who is responsible for sustainability? Elin Larsson, Sustainability Manager at Filippa K, said that it should be easier for consumers to care for their clothing. Extending the average life of your clothes by just three months leads to a 5-10 percent reduction in carbon, water and waste footprint according to Larsson. Therefore Filippa K does no longer only sell clothing, but also garment care items. She also pointed out that that wool, for example, is a self-cleaning material that only needs to be aired to regain freshness and if there is pilling you can use a sweater stone to remove it. Furthermore you should invest in an old-school clothing brush to reduce pilling and add shine to your special items.

Next weekends NK Talks invites consumers to a conversation on digitalization, interior design and beauty. Check out the full schedule and get inspired for fall.

The Stockholm Act

Malin Viola Wennberg — Mon, 21 Aug 2017 09:40:06 +0000

This week Stockholm takes a stand for sustainability with the festival The Stockholm Act. The festival runs from today Monday August 22 through Sunday August 27. The Stockholm Act brings together art, science, business and politics to collaborate and mobilize around the Agenda 2030 for sustainable development.

The Stockholm Act

The opening ceremony will take place at the Stockholm House of Culture & City Theatre at 1 pm today Monday. Amongst others you can listen to Gunhild Storadlen, Johan Rockström and Isabella Lövin. The opening ceremony is open to everyone and you can reserve your seat here.

Some fashion highlights this week will be Houdini Morning Hangout – rooftop yoga and neuroscience lecture at 7 am on Tuesday. Also, don’t miss the Care and Repair event and Fashion Flea Market by Electrolux, Houdini and Make it Last at The Nordic Museum on Thursday and Friday. Representatives from Electrolux and Make it Last will be speaking at the opening on Thursday, August 24 at 12 pm, together with Pauline Ström Gunnér of the Swedish Fashion Council. See the full schedule here, and remember that all events are admission free!

Care and Repair

The Retail Experience 2.0

Malin Viola Wennberg — Sun, 06 Aug 2017 10:19:17 +0000

Once again we are met with the news of retail death and declining sales. Stores are struggling to compete with the online market and are forced to downsize. In the light of these facts – what will be the retail experience 2.0?

Balenciaga takeover at Colette – June 19 to August 5, 2017

Recent reports show that the American retailers are heading for its worst year so far. There have been 5,300 store closing announcements through June 20, making it the second worst year on record at the six-month mark. In July Parisian cult retailer Colette announced that they would be closing their doors for good in December 2017. Colette is one of the few brick-a-mortar stores who are still profitable, yet they decide to shut down their business. In a message communicated through their Instagram account on July 12^th, Colette announces: “As all good things must come to an end, after 20 wonderful years, colette should be closing its doors on December 20th of this year. Colette Roussaux has reached the time when she would like to take her time; and Colette cannot exist without Colette.” They are not closing because of negative numbers; they are closing because of what could become negative numbers with the wrong leadership in the age of online shopping. Consumers today don’t visit the brick-a-mortar retailer to actually make a purchase, they come to try on the size and see the color in real life. Then they go home, log on to Amazon Prime and find the product online at a better price. In this time of ecommerce booming, how does one stay relevant?

Photo by UNIQLO

Japanese fast fashion company Uniqlo is trying out a new approach this August; they have installed a vending machine dispensing clothing at Oakland Airport in California. The vending machines will stock men and women’s shirts and lightweight jackets at a price of about $15 and $70. Uniqlo says they plan to install nine other machines at airports and malls in Los Angeles, Houston and New York in the coming months.

In Shanghai we’ve seen the first permanent high-tech automated convinces stores make its entrance on the market. The company is called BingoBox, but is actually the brainchild of Swedish start-up Wheelys. The BingoBox stores are open 24/7 offering instant noodles, beer and traditional snacks. Inside there is also a microwave, a shared mobile phone charger, a freezer and a soy milk machine – but there is no staff at the check out. BOF writes, “The convenience store, powered by WeChat, requires no checkout, no cash and no salespeople. Customers scan QR codes to enter the store and select products, and then pay using their mobile WeChat wallets. Sensors on the shelves detect the removal of items. Once an item has been removed, it is linked to the shopper’s unique ID in the smartphone app to prevent theft.”

hm.com

In addition to the high-tech no-staff experience we also see the development of the complete opposite; a retailer that focus on the senses and of the consumer and welcome them to a cup of coffee. The latest addition to the H&M group ARKET is soon to open up its doors in London later this month. The store will include a mix of existing brands as well as their own line of clothing, accessories, shoes and interior design for men, women and children. In addition to the fully stacked shelves of consumer goods most stores will have a café. ARKET will offer a menu inspired by new Nordic food culture. The ARKET Café is said to aim for a casual and warm atmosphere with a friendly approach. All in an effort to create a more including shopping experience.

Second Hand beats Recycled

Malin Viola Wennberg — Wed, 05 Jul 2017 10:37:52 +0000

To recycle your clothes is somewhat better than simply putting them in the trash bin, but to buy second hand is the real climate saver.

New LCA (life cycle analysis) research from Sandra Roos, Mistra Future Fashion and Chalmers University , shows that the highest climate impact comes from the production phase, and it doesn’t matter if it’s from virgin materials or recycled materials. On average to produce the fiber accounts for 15% of the total climate impact whiles the production phase i.e. thread spinning, weaving, dying and sewing accounts for 55% of the total impact. Buying second hand therefore saves up to 70% of the total impact since you are essentially skipping the production process in all. Recycled fibers are usually put through the production phase once again when being made into new fabric, which means additional pollution and energy consumption is added.

Courtesy of H&M

Several of the large clothing chains, such as H&M, The Gap and Gina Tricot are all accepting textile donations under mantras such as “Closing the Loop”. They encourage the consumer to bring in their old clothes in return for a voucher to buy new garments. But what happens to these donations? Many of our clothes today consist of mixed fibers. A pair of jeans for example is often a mix between cotton and elastan. Once the fibers are mixed it is a very hard and recourse demanding process to separate them again. The only garments that are recycled into new textiles today are 100% cotton, mainly white sheets, which are easy to dye again. Approximately 10% of our donations are sold as second hand within EU borders, 40% are sold to third world countries where the companies no longer control their end destination, another 40% ends up as isolation or low quality products to be sold in third world countries and the last 10% is usually burnt. Numbers borrowed from David Palm, Ramböll.

Furthermore, the choice of transportation to and from the store accounts for up to 22% of the total climate impact. This means that if you take the car to the store and buy a garment made out of for example recycled polyester the small win from buying recycled is overshadowed by your choice of transportation. End in end, in a perfect world we would all use public transportation to reach a second hand store where we buy all our clothes and make sure we maintain them in good condition for as long as possible.

The Almedal Wardrobe is Open

Malin Viola Wennberg — Mon, 03 Jul 2017 08:09:00 +0000

Almedalen

The politics week “Almedalen” in Visby, on the island of Gotland in Sweden, has officially started! It is the place to be for politicians, businesses, the culture industries and other sectors. The Almedal Week has been organized on Gotland for almost fifty years now. It all began in 1968 when former Minister of Education and Prime Minister Olof Palme spoke from a truck at Kruttornet in Almedalen. Ever since the event has developed to be the biggest political event of its kind in Sweden.

The Almedal Lending Wardrobe 2017

Today Monday 3^rd of July marks the opening of “The Alemdal Lending Wardrobe”. For the second year in a row Swedish Fashion Council, together with The Swedish Trade Ministry will host “The Almedal Wardrobe”. At the wardrobe you can rent clothes for any occasion, to wear during a speech or at a party later on in the evening. The aim of The Almedal Wardrobe is to promote new business models and contribute to a more sustainable fashion industry.   The wardrobe is made possible by Boomerang, Ellos, Filippa K, H&M, IKEA, Indiska, KappAhl, Lindex, MQ, Myrorna, Nudie Jeans, Åhléns, Vagabond Shoemakers & The steamery.

This year, The Almedal Wardrobe has initiated a new collaboration with the Swedish auction site Tradera. Some of the garments borrowed from the wardrobe will be auctioned off starting on June 30th until July 9^th, place your bid HERE. All profit will go towards the Nature Conservation Association.  Some of those who are a little extra conscious about their clothing choices and want to promote the environment by borrowing items from The Almedal Wardrobe are Annie Lööf, party leader of the Center Party, Elisabeth Thand Ringqvist, chairman of the Swedish Risk Capital Association, Alice Teodorescu, lead writer at Göteborg- Posten, Per Bolund, Minister for Finance and Consumer Affairs, Ann Linde, Minister for EU and Trade, Ann Söderlund, Author and Journalist, Hanna Lidström, Spokesperson for Green Youth, Karin Johansson, President of Swedish Trade and Gustaf Reinfeldt, PR Consultant.

If you are in Visby this week you will find the wardrobe at the Kårhuset Rindi, Donnersgata 1, Monday to Friday from 9-5. Don’t forget to follow @Swedishfashioncouncil on Instagram for daily updates.

World Ocean Day and News From Stella McCartney

Malin Viola Wennberg — Thu, 08 Jun 2017 05:41:32 +0000

Why We Need World Ocean Day

Today, June 8^th is World Ocean Day. It’s a truth that our oceans, the most important eco systems on the earth, are dying. We need to make a change in order to save them. One of the main problems is plastic waste. According to recent studies presented by the organization Parley For The Oceans, at least 40 million pounds of plastic has accumulated and is floating in the North Pacific Ocean alone. Over time the plastic degenerates into smaller pieces in the ocean. Aquatic life and seabirds then mistake the plastic fragments for food and ingest it, causing the animal to slowly die. Furthermore, a significant amount of this plastic is washed ashore everyday polluting our beaches as well.

Parley For The Oceans

Plastic waste comes in many forms, for example from micro plastic in skincare, plastic fragments from synthetic textiles as well as from pet bottles. There is a few easy steps towards cleaner an healthier oceans. As a consumer you can choose products made from biodegradable materials instead of plastic. Moreover, you can choose to support organizations and companies that are working towards cleaner oceans, such as Parley For The Oceans.

Stella McCartney in New Partnership to Save the Oceans

For 2017 World Ocean Day British fashion label Stella McCartney announced that they are entering a long-term partnership with the organization Parley For The Oceans. One of the organizations biggest initiatives is the creation of a yarn fiber that is made from plastic objects such as fishing nets, debris and bottles that are collected from oceans. McCartney says the brand plans to use this yarn in their upcoming collections. “To take something that is destructive and turn it into something that’s sexy and cool, how can that not be luxury?” Ms. McCartney said to the New York Times. The yarn will be used in product such as shoes, bags and outerwear and the first pieces will be in store already in July. Parley For The Oceans have previously collaborated with Adidas in creating a running shoe made out of recycled plastic fishnet.

Parley For the Ocean x Adidas

The Ocean Conference at the UN

In conjunction with World Ocean day the UN is putting on a five-day conference called “The Ocean Conference”. It is held at United Nations Headquarters in New York from 5 to 9 June 2017, to support the implementation of sustainable development goal 14, “Life below the water”. The Governments of Fiji and Sweden is co-hosting the conference.

Is Fashion Retail Dead?

Malin Viola Wennberg — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 20:51:45 +0000

The question every fashion professional is asking themselves right now – is retail dead? Online shopping has been on a steady rise for the last 20 years, and traditional retailers are closing down their stores. We’ve seen well established brands such as Abercrombie & Fitch, American Apparel, Guess and JCPenny downsize their number of stores and even closing out for good. Is it the end of an era or a transition period to something new and improved?

While stores are closing down, German Online Retailer Zalando just presented an expected 22-24% increase in revenue after 2017’s first quarter. Swedish online retailers like Nelly and NA-KD are showing similar results. Numbers are clear – consumers are turning to the online stores.

Landing page at Zalando.com

So, what’s to gain from shopping online? The obviously pros are access and availability. Thanks to the Internet your physical location does no longer dictate what you can access. As long as you can pay for it the latest Gucci it-bag is yours no matter where you live. Furthermore you no longer need any kind of transportation, or even a pair of legs for that matter, to shop for fashion. I would almost go as far as to say that online retailers have democratized fashion.

However there is the question of fit and feel. If you don’t have the possibility to try on a pair of shoes in the store before you buy them, how will you know if they fit your feet? Most online retailers describe their products in-depth and provides all possible measurements but there’s still something special to experiencing the hand-feel of a garment. Because of this online shopping will evidently create more returns than in-store shopping and all shipping back and forth is another torn in the side of our planet.

From Business of Fashion interview with Farfetch

Are we too lazy to visit a physical store? Can our planet handle the amount of returns online shopping creates? Is there a third option? Temporary pop-up stores are becoming more popular. America online brand Everlane is one of the brands using pop-ups and events as a platform to meet with their customers wile maintaining a strong online presence. Furthermore British online retailer Farfetch presented The Future Retail Experience just the other week. Maybe retail isn’t dead; maybe it’s just transitioning into something better.