My wonderfully minimal friend, Ms Mc, recently invited me along to a Q&A panel discussion at Bobbin & Ink in Petersham, centering around how we can all join the fashion revolution and call for greater transparency, sustainability and ethics in the fashion industry.
On the panel were Kirsten Lee, a strong advocate for ethical and sustainable practices in the fashion industry, Jessica Parker from The Social Outfit and Osha Shealey from Bilboa.These three incredibly knowledgeable, passionate women answered questions about their involvement in the Fashion Revolution as well as how they are ethical and sustainable in their own fashion adventures.
Osha has her own brand, Bilboa, which is located on the NSW North Coast at Byron Bay, where she prints her own fabric and hand makes everything she sells - check her out at http://www.bilboa.com.au/ or Finders Keepers markets around the place. She is also in the process of getting her ethical fashion accreditation.
Jess is part of the Social Outfit, a registered charity who employ and train people from refugee and new migrant communities. They provide training and employment in clothing production, retail, design and marketing. Seriously amazing! They are located at 353, King Street, Newtown where they make and also sell their clothes. You can even pop out the back to see where the clothes are made!
I also discovered from Kirsten, who is so very passionate about ethical fashion and the education of up-and-coming designers, there is an app, Good On You, where you can check the impact a brand is having on people, the planet and animals. You can use this app to see how brands rate, find more ethical brands and see some great deals from ethical brands.
As part of the event there was a Fashion Swap. People were encouraged to bring along up to six garments of clothes that they no longer wanted, were in good condition and clean.Upon arriving at the event, you handed in your clothes and received a token for each piece of clothing you had to swap. That token represented one piece of clothing you could choose as part of the swap.
The clothes were grouped into areas, i.e. dresses, short pants, skirts, tops etc. Once everyone with tokens had made their selection, it was free for all to go through what remained.
If any clothes weren't swapped at the end they would be bagged up and donated to charity.
This event was part of the Fashion Revolution week held by, of course, The Fashion Revolution.
Fashion Revolution is a global movement calling for greater transparency, sustainability and ethics in the fashion industry. Their goal is to unite the fashion industry and ignite revolution to radically change the way our clothes are sourced, produced and purchased, so that what the world wears has been made in a safe, clean and fair way.
It was such an amazing event and I learnt so much about ethical and sustainable fashion.
Have you ever had a fashion swap?
Do you have any favourite ethical brands?
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