“I didn’t really decide myself. People saw me in the street picking up umbrellas and said it was like Mary Poppins. I had the idea of Marypup because it’s funny,” says designer and eco-activist Melanie Iudica, as she recalls how the name of her upcycled rainwear brand...
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Something borrowed
Earth Day seems appropriate to talk about something borrowed. The trousers covering my tush and blouse on my back [leased from Laura Ironside] and of course the earth are all borrowed. Fashion is just one piece of the sustainable development pie, but today also marks...
Designing a happy wardrobe
I didn’t see myself squeezing into another capsule challenge so soon - having spent 6 of the coldest weeks in just 6 items of clothes for Labour Behind the Label at the start of the year - but this was too good to resist… 10 items, 10 days, easy right? Ah, but this...
Seville travel diary – A week on the tiles
Nobody wants to feel like a tourist. Who us? No no, we’re trailblazers - so you can imagine our surprise when we discovered our destination of choice is Lonely Planet’s No.1 city to visit in 2018. If like me you have to work through some guilt before enjoying your...
I want an eco-hot relationship with my clothes – Interview with COSSAC
Today’s eco-warrior is less hemp, more hot. I don’t mean to do a disservice to the durable natural fibre, but hemp clothing is still building a new rep amongst fashion seekers that have discovered sexy and sustainable can coexist - as they do in the #ecohot label...
The Ned and TED Talks
The respectfully renovated Portland Stone building on Poultry Street, The Ned was the perfect setting to speak about how my reclaimed renovation resulted in me wearing the same six items of clothes for six weeks. There's been a bit of friendly competition in our...
Six Items Challenge : Day 11 and 12
On arrival in Brighton yesterday I was confronted by my ten year old self. Two girls dressed almost identically were leaving the train station - one had a mini pink backpack (like the one I had from Tammy Girl) and both were wearing skater sneakers. They linked arms...
Six Items Challenge : Day 7 and 8
I saw the Queen yesterday (the day I wore jeans). More on that later as I didn’t have the energy to write last night. This morning my friend made me chuckle with a link to an Inc. article - Why Successful People Wear the Same Thing Every Day You see by wearing the...
Six Items Challenge : Day 6
Wore my M-24 backpack made of used truck tarpaulin to the Designer Showrooms today. Fashion week has a growing number of sustainable brands and stands - one being The Sustainable Angle, a not for profit organisation dedicated to projects that promote sustainable...
Six Items Challenge : Day 5
I met a fashion journalist from Spain the other day and we joked that even if it means crossing the road, stopping to soak up every moment of sunshine is essential to make it through the grey months in London. Fashion week might be all about autumn winter collections,...
Six Items Challenge : Day 3
It may be day three of my challenge for Labour Behind the Label, but it really only got challenging today on the first day of London Fashion Week. For some reason it felt like my first day at school. Perhaps it's because when you're a kid you get away with wearing...
Six Items Challenge : Day 1
©IWM (D 14826) Lent hasn't fallen on Valentine's Day since 1945. Today shiny heart shaped gifts and ash crosses collide, as I start my Six Items Challenge. I pledged to only wear six items of clothing for the next six weeks in support of Labour Behind the Label, a...
My fashion fast to fight fast fashion
I have pledged to only wear six items of clothing for six weeks - starting just before London Fashion Week If it takes a collective to make a fashion, it takes collective action to end fashion abuse. The Six Items Challenge is a campaign created by Labour...
Sustainable designer Laura Ironside on season-less dressing
Sometimes less is more. This is the approach of designer Laura Ironside, who set-up her label with the aim of creating seasonless garments, thoughtfully, through sensitive and sustainable manufacturing. For some, sustainable fashion is a contradiction in terms, and...
Slowly does it Reclaimed Woman
Laura Ironside / Tallboy Interiors
Defining sustainable fashion with Stella McCartney’s Dessert Island Discs
Aside from the fact I love a bit of Radio 4's Dessert Island Discs (where presenter Kirsty Young asks famous guests to pick eight records to take if they were to be stranded on a dessert island), Stella McCartney's Dessert Island Discs seemed a good excuse to define...