Anna at Last

It was over two months ago now that Anna Korte’s jewelry literally stopped me in my tracks at Alberta Street's Last Thursday. Since then, I’ve harped on about plans to purchase a piece of her repurposed-vintage jewelry for my cousin (see 6.24's "Presenting Repurposed" post.) and harassed the gracious designer with endless emails full of questions.

Last night, I finally met the lovely, bubbly lady in person (at this month’s Last Thursday), and couldn’t limit myself to the heart-charm necklace for my cousin (which was even more charming in person) as planned. I caved in and got myself a low-hanging, nautical-themed pendant necklace.













But how can I feel guilty adorning myself with the original work of a local designer who makes use of materials that others might toss? Perhaps that’s the number one danger of sustainable fashion design—with a good cause behind one's purchases, it’s even harder to stop oneself from shopping.

Seeking A Mean (Green) Jean

I had a “shopping report” due today for one of the fashion design courses in which I’m enrolled. Oh drudgery of all drugeries, actually being required to shop. (Can I be enrolled in fashion design courses forever? Please?) So that I wouldn’t be tempted to chalk up a massive price-tag, I decided to keep with a recent theme and chose to investigate sustainable jeans. (Having bought a pair of Eduns a few weeks ago, I knew I would not be able to come with any excuse to purchase another pair, and that this topic was therefore safe ground.) The assignment was to search for a specific product in three different types of stores-- boutique, specialty store, department store. My investigations admittedly only scratched the surface, and the process of writing the report made me realize that there are dozens of potential postings on this complex subject. For now, though, I’ll be lazy and excerpt for you a few of my musings as they appeared in the report which I would be more than happy to have assigned to me on a weekly basis.

"Jeans have come a long way from the intentionally hard-wearing (and therefore heavy and stiff) work uniform of the American West. These days, jeans are no longer a symbol of working-class status; rather, they are softened and faded with toxic chemicals to create desirable and flexible styles... Many consumers who would not usually spend more than one hundred dollars on just any pair of pants are willing to “invest” in a pair of jeans. While the jeans we buy these days may be pre-worn paper-thin, the conception of jeans as long-lasting and durable endures. Coupled with the idea of jeans as a supremely flexible and fundamental element of one’s wardrobe (they can be dressed up or dressed down; worn both to the farmer’s market and to dinner at a fancy restaurant when paired with different shoes and tops), jeans become a very legitmate wardrobe “investment” for a broad base of shoppers in American culture. Sustainable fashion designers, therefore, have a vested interest in overcoming the “sustainability” challenges of jeans production in order to reap the benefits of this lucrative industry. While there are many “pending projects” of this nature (a few chronicled in the article “It’s not Easy Being Jeans” in the Sustainable Style section of this May’s Vogue), relatively few such products are available on racks in Portland stores.”

I don’t want to bore you with tome after tome on jeans, so instead I’ll give you a brief synopsis of the 1600 words that followed these in my report. At Greenloop (see my initial posting on the sustainable boutique just below), I tried on a pair of tapered Anna Cohen jeans made of extremely raw (and therefore very dark) denim.
They had only one pair left, which perhaps was why they fit me funny (I wasn’t paying attention to size at all, and they were perhaps not meant for my body in the least) but they do indeed look smashing on both the ladies in this shoot (above).

Greenloop also stocks San Francisco-based Del Forte, which, while quite sumptuous to the touch (and perhaps the closest to what one might expect from a more mainstream jeans company), were sadly a little too flared for my personal style (pictured here). My interest is piqued though—they certainly have an impeccable hand, and now I’m on a rampant search to see what their other offerings are in terms of cut. Of all the denim I put on at Greenloop, a pair of Loomstates was the greatest temptation. The “Pelagic Maiden Jeans” were the first pair of wide-leg jeans I’ve tried in quite some time that were actually flattering. (For this reason, I don’t think I’ve worn wide-leg jeans since junior high). The black and white polka-dot pocket lining was of course an added bonus, given my minor recent obsession.

My inquiries resulted in visits to Saks (to check out “Citizens of Humanity”) and American Apparel as well, but Saks was a stretch, and any discussion of American Apparel is opening a lengthy (if insanely interesting) can of worms—a can of worms I will indeed open, it’s just too late for it tonight. But soon…

Out of the Way, In the Loop

I’d been putting off the trip I took today for some months now. I’d perused the Greenloop webstore (thegreenloop.com) countless times, but I wanted to physically set foot in the sustainable style store before coming to any conclusions. However, being entirely reliant on public transportation, I balked when the Trimet website indicated that I would have to transfer three times to arrive at the store’s front door after almost an hour of transit. Then, a few days ago, I finally made one attempt to get there that left me stranded me roadside at the wrong stop amidst boarded up storefronts and smut shops of non-sidewalked suburbia with the skies raining down on me. Yikes. I just turned around and headed home. But I woke up this morning resolute—I would make use of a potentially lazy Sunday and explore.

Greenloop is relatively new to its new location in the bustling, family-oriented Sellwood neighborhood, where it’s housed in the B.F. Smith House—a late nineteenth-century historic building set back from a street lined with antique shops and cafes. In step with the homey, low-key interior, Greenloop stocks a surprisingly casual look. Perhaps it’s not so surprising—this is, after all, Oregon, home of the home office and telecommuting in pjs. A notable exception was a dreamily soft pair of slacks—regrettably too heavy for summer—by Anna Cohen.












(Leave it to the queen of eco-conscious Italian street couture to knock it up a notch.) Perhaps I have a limited point of comparison, which consists entirely of Arboretum, located in the land of country estates and toney social functions. Greenloop, in contrast, carries loads of practicalities such as tees, sandals, and jeans, and has an extensive menswear section.

As I understand it, Greenloop is the city’s only sustainable fashion design boutique (though individual sustainable designers do have storefronts), which I quite selfishly consider unfortunate, as it is located an hour away from me. But Greenloop’s physical location isn’t of utter importance, it seems, as by far the majority of their sales are through their extensive online store. And even if you can’t stop in with frequency, you can stay in touch via their blog, not too far away at greenloop.blogspot.com.

Edun, in Essence

Another rainy day in Portland. And however sad the lack of summer sun may be, it at least makes me a little smug about the outcome of my most recent sustainable splurge dilemma: some weeks ago, a pair of Edun jeans won out over a crème cap-sleeve mini-dress by Bahar Shahpar at my new favorite boutique. (See my post on Arboretum at http://mindfulfinery.blogspot.com/2007/07/edenic-edun-ic-bliss.html. Did I mention that they offer all sorts of reading material on sustainable fashion design for you to peruse while admiring both your companion’s try-ons and the antique sewing machines, typewriters and suitcases that constitute the store’s decor. I’m not endorsed, I promise—maybe just a little in love.) My rainy walks today were pleasant enough clad in my new pants, but there’s no way I could have rocked the mini dress without some serious tights (which wasn’t so appealing in the supremely muggy weather).

To be honest, I only vaguely knew the name “Edun” before my purchase. I suppose I was under the impression that the company’s focus was primarily on ecological sustainability, and I ran with the idea that my new jeans were made of 100% organic cotton (and even told a few people so). Slap on my wrist for assuming that sustainable and organic are interchangeable— lesson learned. Only about forty-two percent of the cotton used in Edun products is organic. (See edunonline.com/live/facts.asp for more Edun factoids of this nature.) Edun’s focus, instead, is on spurring economically sustainable systems and promoting social sustainability around the globe, and is in the process of implementing a “Corporate Social Responsibility strategy.”

The company, established in 2005, is now produced in Peru, Tunisia, Kenya, India, Mauritius and Madagascar and overseen by independent non-profit “Verite” (verite.org) that ensures “safe, fair and legal” working conditions in an effort to “humanize” the global workforce. I read somewhere (and tsk tsk me, but I can’t remember exactly where) a description of Edun’s clothes as “earthy,” which took me aback. While the descriptions proferred by the company itself may invoke a ‘nature idiom’ in its titling of colors and citations of inspiration, I doubt a sense of “earthiness” (or even “naturalness”) would come to mind for most people when presented with the yellow trench, bright white men’s suit or women’s denim set from the S/S 06 collection.



The subsequent season offers quite a distinct look, but the sleek, dark, urban mood of AW06 is nowhere closer to “earthy.”



To digress now into the material pleasures of a well-appointed closet (not to imply that I have one, but rather that it’s something I eternally strive for), and the joy of these new jeans in particular, I’d venture to suggest that they’re the most darn flexible (and I mean that in the sense of stylistically, but neither are they by any means stiff) pants I’ve posessed in some time. They’re successful with cowboy boots, thong sandals, flats (both dressy and casual). They make me feel better about wearing sneakers (which I may now permanently call trainers, just to get over the juvenile associations I have with the American phrase), and they dress up quite easily with a pair of heels. I may now make it my mission to find a pair of shoes with which they don’t work.

One last detail: the inside of Edun jeans are inscribed with text, printed in a pretty, rolling script. Maybe I’m weired, but there’s something I love about being in the middle of getting dressed and stopping to read “We see only death, the free animal” written on the inside of my pants.

The Hannover Principles

I came across this set of sustainable design guiding principles while perusing the Arboretum blog (http://arboretumapparel.com/). This document was originally proposed in the early 90s by William McDonough and Michael Braungart, authors of Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way we Make Things (2002).

What I like about the authors’ approach is embodied in their suggestion that “The Hannover Principles should be seen as a living document committed to the transformation and growth in the understanding of our interdependence with nature, so that they may adapt as our knowledge of the world evolves.” The principles are fluid, and subject to a growth in comprehension. A hopeful openess with which I feel quite familiar. (I’m recalling here my argument for the use of the term “mindful” in the title of this blog.)

What I’m left wondering at most intently is: are there are any specific ways in which these principals should be tweaked when applied specifically to the fashion industry? Or, are there perhaps certain of these principles that are more pertinent to apparel production than others?

1. Insist on rights of humanity and nature to co-exist in a healthy, supportive, diverse and sustainable condition.
2. Recognize interdependence. The elements of human design interact with and depend upon the natural world, with broad and diverse implications at every scale. Expand design considerations to recognizing even distant effects.
3. Respect relationships between spirit and matter. Consider all aspects of human settlement including community, dwelling, industry and trade in terms of existing and evolving connections between spiritual and material consciousness.
4. Accept responsibility for the consequences of design decisions upon human well-being, the viability of natural systems and their right to co-exist.
5. Create safe objects of long-term value. Do not burden future generations with requirements for maintenance or vigilant administration of potential danger due to the careless creation of products, processes or standards.
6. Eliminate the concept of waste. Evaluate and optimize the full life-cycle of products and processes, to approach the state of natural systems, in which there is no waste.
7. Rely on natural energy flows. Human designs should, like the living world, derive their creative forces from perpetual solar income. Incorporate this energy efficiently and safely for responsible use.
8. Understand the limitations of design. No human creation lasts forever and design does not solve all problems. Those who create and plan should practice humility in the face of nature. Treat nature as a model and mentor, not as an inconvenience to be evaded or controlled.
9. Seek constant improvement by the sharing of knowledge. Encourage direct and open communication between colleagues, patrons, manufacturers and users to link long term sustainable considerations with ethical responsibility, and re-establish the integral relationship between natural processes and human activity.
(http://www.mindfully.org/Sustainability/Hannover-Principles.htm)

O Yohji

I've been meaning to spend some serious time extolling the virtues of thrift-store shopping. It's a healthy habit for any mindful fashion-addict, in being inherently sustainable (reducing potential waste by reusing existent pieces) and as a good exercise in creativity (the challenge of seeing stylish potential in abandoned garments). Vintage clothing purchases can also be the most rewarding, imbuing a kind of pride in having discovered treasures that no one else could detect. I myself am still glowing from my most recent thiftstore find.

It's a little ode to Yohji Yamamoto's A/W 07 white-and-black polka-dots. And while his playful rotating hoopskirts probably raised a few amused eyebrows in fashion capitals, my significantly less extreme take on the pattern is sure to do the same on Portland city streets. Oh the pleasures of befuddling people.


Hurray for shoulder-padded high-waited polka-dot jumpsuits! And hurrah for Yohji, for daring me to do it.

Ready to Dye

(Ok, I'll stop with the un-funny pun titles about dyeing—tolerate this self-indulgdent Biggie reference and I promise I'll swear them off.)

After my first botched dyeing attempt, and my subsequent whining about the natural dyeing guidelines proferred in the current issue of ReadyMade (you can read the full posting at mindfulfinery.blogspot.com/2007/07/dyeing-little-inside.html), I thought that perhaps I hadn't given their advice enough of a chance and I decided to try again, this time following the outlined procedure more closely. My substance of choice for round two: coffee.

I cut the top off a jersey sundress and brewed a pot of coffee. (The skirt had a small stain, and I thought I was more likely to be able to repurpose the pieces as separates anyway.) My main error when dyeing with wine had been not creating enough dyebath and though the top was pretty tiny, a single pot failed to enable the shirt to fully submerge (see photograph), a tell-tale predictor of blotchiness I recognized from my previous experiment. So I brewed a second pot and poked at the fabric until it was entirely under the surface. (I, by the way, highly recommend playing with taking photographs of dark dye-baths in white buckets under bright sunlight with a flash—here's one result of my own tangential experimentation.)

I did not use a mordant (the lack of which I speculated was problematic in my first foray into natural dyeing) because I was trying to follow the Readymade instructions as closely as possible (and there was no mention of mordants in the article). I left the coffee and fabric mixture set for about seven hours, and then rinsed the shirt, and tossed it in the dryer with some fabric softener

Who knew strong coffee and pinot were basically the same color? Even seven hours of dyeing left me with no rich coffee tone, but rather a dirty beige. It's so subtle that I feel I need to indicate that the dyed version is the one on the left.

However unenthused by my color results as I may be, all of my dirty-looking outcomes serve to appreciably increase my admiration for the hues of Alex Crandall's naturally-dyed pieces in the AI senior show last month. (Read my posting on the show at midfulfinery.blogspot.com/2007/06/knew-wear-where.html.)

Regardless, I'm learning, and even more tempted to see what results something vibrant (i.e. not inclined to boring washed-out browns) might yeild. Beets, anyone?

Edenic (Edun-ic) Bliss

Yet another week has passed and not a single peep from me. This time, however, it was not technological frustration but California sunshine that kept me from writing, but certainly not from shopping.

I was vacationing in the Bay area on a little trip back to my old stomping grounds in Sonoma County (read: gorgeous wine country), eager to see what's developed since I'd left and not just a little excited to visit a new addition to the Healdsburg shopping scene: "Arboretum." Healdsburg is the jewel in Sonoma County's tourism crown, and has a thriving high-end boutique scene to show for it. Arboretum has seemingly seamlessly fit right in, but with a unique and crucial twist. According to their blog/website (http://arboretumapparel.com, which co-owner Andy Barrett pooh-poohed, claiming that a "real" website is in the works, though in my opinion it's certainly worth a look as is) Arboretum's mission is to "promote sound environmental and ethical manufacturing processes. Arboretum customers can feel positive about the impact their purchases have on both their wardrobes and our earth." The lines they carry are "mindful" in a variety of ways, and the wares are indeed quite temptingly fine.

Among the many brands they carry: Rag and Bone, Nili Lotan, Prairie Underground and Linda Loudermilk. I tried on a few sweet summer dresses--which is really the last thing I need more of—the highlight being a cream cap-sleeve number by Bahar Shahpar. Honestly, this photograph doesn't do it justice—you can't tell how mod it really is. (The dress is perhaps more widely known via Vogue's May 07 "Sustainable Style" feature, worn well by Inhabitat.com's founder Jill Fehrenbacher.)

And though I'm no jeans-and-tee-shirt gal by a long shot, I was trying to buy with the future in mind, which includes upcoming wardrobe work on a film shot on location in the woods (more on that later), which requires a little more rough-and-tumble capability on the part of my own wardrobe. I haven't been wooed by a tee-shirt in years, but I was severely tempted by this worn-so-soft-it's-almost-see-through item by "Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." While forty for a tee-shirt seemed a little steep, splurging on a pair of value-conscious jeans seemed well in order. And while finding the right jeans always seems to be a struggle, I was drawn to the distinctive back pocket stitching (a kind of abstract and simplistic leaf shape) on a pair of Eduns, and the fit turned out to be spot on.

More on Edun and its "trade not aid" approach to economic sustainability soon. In the meanwhile, an awkward shot of some of the details of my new darkwashed (and guilt free!) obsession.

Little Crush on the Prairie

So maybe I’ve always thought pioneers rocked. (I was Laura Ingalls Wilder—that’s the author of the Little House on the Prairie books, for those that had incomplete childhoods—for Halloween… twice.) Or maybe it’s just Oregon with all its pioneer regalia and trailblazer touting that has inspired this in me.

Everything they need and nothing more. In addition to being interested in calicos and plaids and long-sleeve dresses, I like the the use of fabrics over and over again, in different capacities, for different purposes, shirt to curtain to patchwork quilt: the original American repurposed-apparel practice.

Maybe I don’t know enough about the pioneer lifestyle to say whether they really are good poster-children for sustainability (it seems to me they would be, given their utter self-reliance), but I would like a poster-size print of this photograph.

A Thesis on "Green"

I gave my qualms about the term “green” a meager shot at the outset. I think Katie Kurtz has pinpointed precisely what I tried to say (and in a more informed way) in the synopsis of her Masters Thesis entitled “Global Warming is Hot: Branding ‘Green’ in the Age of Climate Change.”

What Kurtz (a contributor to the San Francisco Bay Guardian who writes primarily about visual arts) suggests certainly bears keeping in mind during my investigations into the apparel industry’s ever-growing realm of “sustainable design” (a term which is probably problematic in a similar way, though not as widely used). The excerpt resonated enough for me to want to include it here in full, and feels to me somehow particularly relevant to the term’s application to the fashion industry, and fashion marketing in particular.

“Although green has experienced high currency in the past two years as a code word for all things environmental, it acts as shorthand for something that is not readily apparent and, subsequently, may not be readily understood. Green caught on in the 1970s as a descriptor for environmental issues, but the current popular interpretation is severed from the radical ideological roots proposed by the green social movement and the political framework adopted by the Green Party. While the term is used frequently within environmentalist and sustainability sectors, corporations, marketers, and the media are increasingly defining what green means. Green principles vary from one industry to the next, and as more corporations enter the green fray to address both consumer desire and the bottom line (“green washing,” as it is often called), standardization of a product’s greenness varies. The different applications of green strain its meaning, making it a loosely applied
term that requires contextualization with each use. As it stands now, green functions as a catchword encompassing multiple meanings and thus promoting a lifestyle that does not necessarily align with an environmental ethic. Ultimately, the current green rubric advocates a type of consumer ideology that empowers individuals through their purchasing choices while simultaneously eliding the primary issue it once sought to address: global warming.”

(from California College of the Arts MA in Visual Criticism Thesis Presentations Symposium: http://sites.cca.edu/sightlines/2007/kurtz.html)

Dyeing a Little Inside

It’s been a rough week. For one, my internet’s been out (hence the lack of posts) and I’ve spent much of that time wandering downtown trying unsuccessfully to flag down free wirless on my little old laptop. But it’s back now, miraculously, just in time for me to record my first foray into all-natural dyeing: an experiment which I botched (or, more precisely, splotched).

I’d begun to get really intrigued by natural dyeing after reading an article on it (“In Living Color”) in the June/July issue of ReadyMade, a twenty-something-oriented DIY magazine. (It is, by the way, ReadyMade’s fashion issue and contains some ideas/resources that are very pertitent to the subject of this blog, as sustainabitiy and DIY so often go hand-in-hand.)

The brief article offers four suggestions for natural dyebaths—red onion skins (for ruddy browns), turmeric (yellows), coffee (obvious), and beets (shades of pink to bright magenta). But I didn’t have any turmeric or beets around, this is a strictly yellow onion household, and my coffee’s too precious (and expensive) to use for a craft experiment. What I did have was a half-empty bottle of red wine that came with the apartment, and had likely been uncorked over a year ago. I had been avoiding trying to figure out how to get rid of it.

I poured the putrid-smelling pinot (which had turned some odd, orange-y color) into a large plastic bucket and added an equal amount of water, so that the white shirt I was dyeing could be fully submerged. I stirred the shirt around in the dyebath a couple of times during the four hours I let it soak. The color (pictured here in contrast to its original color) turned out more beige than I’d anticipated, and fairly light as well. (It could have probably soaked overnight, and perhaps in hot water.)

A bigger problem here was the lack of a very crucial ingredient that was not once mentioned in the ReadyMade article: a “mordant”. The article warns that natural dyes fade out—their dyes certainly would fade if they’re not preparing their fabrics with any sort of color fixative. Most natural dyes need a plant base AND a mineral mordant (to fix the color). More on mordants once I’ve experimented with them myself.

Really, my biggest mistake was the quantity of dye-bath I prepared. I underestimated how much liquid the shirt would absorb, and by the end of the four hours the shirt was definitely not fully submerged. You can see where the shirt stuck out of the dye-bath—it’s apparent in a band of white splotches across the chest. If only I’d done my own reasearch (independent of the ReadyMade advice) first! I’ve found the most complete and straightforward guidelines on the “Aurora
Silk” website: http://www.aurorasilk.com/info/natural-dying.shtml.

My blatant mistakes this time around have made want to try again, and have had made me reassess all the ingredients in my kitchen in terms of their staining abilities. I foresee some danger for the white items in my wardrobe--this is kind of addictive.