I’m not big on oatmeal, unless it’s cooked with soya milk for breakfast, but this is the natural constituency of organic cotton. Like most people, I prefer my clothes with a little colour. Unfortunately, the dye industry is another of fashion’s dirty little secrets. Vast amounts of water are used in the process (around 40-50l per kilo of fabric) and much is contaminated with dye and is not recycled. Dr Juncheng Hu from the South-Central University for Nationalities in Wuhan says that in China alone 1.6 billion tons of dye-laden wastewater is pumped into the river systems every year. According to Dr Harold Freeman, CIBA professor of dyestuff chemistry at North Carolina State University, the problem may be as simple as the fact that drinking water is now coloured and the dye is not readily removed. Many dyes also contain toxic chemicals and heavy metals, for example, the popular Procion Turquoise MX-G contains 1 to 5% copper.

 

One solution is to use natural dyes, made from plants, such as madder and woad. Dr G Badri Narayanan from Purdue University calculated that if India only used natural dyes the amount of pollution released into the water would be halved. In UK the newly founded Cotton Roots uses natural dyes. The company make T-shirts and hoodies and specialise in customising organic and fairtrade clothes for the corporate sector. MD Susan Waters had the idea for the company as she was sipping a cup of tea in the Victoria and Albert Museum after viewing a clothing collection that was hundreds of years old yet still colourful. She thought that perhaps we should be copying our ancestors and using plants, minerals, salt and sunlight to dye clothes today too. The possibilities, she says, are endless from real tea-shirts to coffee-dyed aprons for baristas.

 

 

This is all very admirable, particularly in the commercial world, but many natural dyes are not without their problems either. First, it depends on the mordant used to fix the dye to the cloth – most are very toxic, such as chromium, and large quantities have to be added, typically in a weight equal to or double the weight of the fabric. Alum is one of the better mordants as it’s less toxic (this is what Cotton Roots uses). Secondly, natural dyes typically don’t bond with synthetic textiles like polyester or viscose.

 

Dr Hu and his colleagues have developed a way of cheaply removing dye from water. Plates coated with a material made from nickel oxide suck the dye molecules out of wastewater allowing it to be recycled. The system is not being used but does offer hope. Dr Freeman also claims that dyes are gradually becoming less toxic and more efficient so a smaller amount of water needs to be used in the dye baths. In Europe the label Oeko-Tex Standard 100 ensures that clothes have not been dyed with ‘chemicals harmful to health’.

 

So, if you’ve read this far, you’ll note the distinctly un-Christmassy tone of my last column of 2009. No, you don’t need a new outfit for Christmas parties, in a vibrant colour or otherwise, you’ve got plenty in your wardrobe. And yes, I am having an attack of sour grapes: at five months pregnant I don’t fit into any of my party frocks.

Readers of online green glamour magazine, Daisy Green, will already be familiar with the concept of swishing, but for the rest of us it sounds a little outré: the sartorial equivalent of chucking your keys on a party table. But swishing, apparently, is set to be the new ethical equivalent of shopping.

My next-door-neighbour (NdN) and I went to a swish in Bath organised by Posh Swaps. The idea behind swishing is to donate your clothes, update your wardrobe and have a fun night out. We were instructed to bring three items of ‘posh clothing’ and in return we could take home three items formerly belonging to someone else. When we arrived the clothes were laid out on tables, a bit like a rather random jumble sale, and we had half an hour to look at them before the ‘swap’ officially started.

About forty women crowded round the tables and NdN and I wondered whether our elbows were going to be sharp enough. I was disappointed – both with the quality and variety of clothes. When the count-down ceased NdN and I each grabbled one thing. Mine was a little black tunic dress. I also had my eye on a floral cardigan in a small size but saw it being scooped up by a lady with a large armload of clothes. “I just love the colours,” she trilled loudly, “I’ve no idea if any of them will fit!” As she was, let’s say, medium sized, I assumed she was getting the cardigan for someone else but thought I’d ask. Very politely I asked if it would be possible to try the cardigan after her if she decided she didn’t want it. She agreed and when she returned from the changing rooms, I approached her. “You’re definitely not having it,” she said, and proceeded to physically push me out of the way in her eagerness to get more clothes.

“Definitely a case of the ugly sisters,” giggled NdN, who’d been watching.

There was almost nothing left, so doing the fashion maths, I’m guessing people took more than they brought. It was all over in thirty sad minutes. I felt swizzed, not swished: I’d spent £16 on a ticket and travel, swapped a designer blouse, a linen jacket and a nice top for a handful of crisps, half a glass of OJ, a bag full of business cards and one squashed Quality Street and a Primark tunic. My suggestion would be to go to a recommended swish, such as Daisy Green’s Big Swish. But hey, apparently the latest craze is going to be vintage jumble sales held in bars with DJs - and rock, booze and frocks always was a potent fashion cocktail.

I promise the rest of Eco Chic will not be maternity related – but as well as wanting to look as reasonably elegant as someone who will shortly be rather rotund, I also don’t want to have stretch marks and I do want to make sure I’m using organic or at least, natural, products since 60-70% of what you put on your skin works its way through the outer layer.

What stops pregnant women getting stretch marks are their genes - how elastic their skin is naturally - plus how quickly the weight piles on. But you can help by using moisturiser. I’ve been using organic, fairtrade shea butter, which is mixed with a little olive oil. It’s solid stuff though and needs softening in hot water. I asked Emma Newman for advice. She trained as a biochemist and now works at Nude Skincare , an ethical company set up by Bono’s wife, Ali Hewson, which have developed a range of skin care products made from natural ingredients. Emma says that shea and cocoa butter are good but that oils are also essential as they contain a high proportion of omega-3.

I’m going to use Neal’s Yard massage oil, which contains neroli essential oil in a blend of soya, almond and wheat germ oil. At some point I’ll switch to their mother’s balm, which can also be used to massage the perineum to prevent tearing. It contains coconut, almond and apricot kernel oil plus bees wax – and nothing else. Lots of essential oils are contra-indicated in pregnancy so I have made my own exfoliant with almond oil, honey, brown sugar and neroli. But my most exciting find is a new company that’s just been launched.

It’s called Buds Cherished Organics (available at www.nakednutrition.com). It’s been developed by a team of parents who wanted an alternative to the synthetic-chemical laden baby-care products commonly available. I can’t yet vouch for their Precious newborn head to toe cleanser, Precious newborn cream or Frost defence – a balm designed to lock out damaging winter winds – but no doubt I’ll be trying them out on the baby come May. In the meantime, I’m using their Beautiful blooming stretch mark cream. It contains tamanol oil and vitamin C to enhance collagen production, Chlorella vulgaris extract to promote elastin production, Inca inchi, an extract from a Peruvian plant designed to help the skin maintain a protective lipid barrier and moisturising jojoba and sesame oil and shea butter. It certainly feels a delight to smooth on and I hope it works!

Pictures courtesy of Buds Cherished Organics

Zoe Robinson is a rare creature: a stylist who specialises in ethical style consultations and make-overs. A professional actress who trained in fashion and textile, Zoe sees the business she’s created (Think-Style) as a way of combining her two loves: “I have a passion for ethical fashion and wanted to combine my love of fashion by helping educate clients about eco-friendly outfits – but I never push too hard. For instance, vintage clothes are unique – no one else will have the same outfit – and that’s often what people focus on.” Zoe also works as a consultant for Eco Concierge and writes for green magazines and websites.

We meet in a chic café in Islington. In person she is warm, friendly, supportive and most decidedly not the type to tell you to shift a few pounds or how dreadful your clothes look. In fact, she’s a perfect example of an eco-fashionista, wearing well cut jeans, high heeled boots, and her grandmother’s top. Normally, for an image consultancy, we would have stood in front of a mirror and she would have measured me up with bits of bamboo to determine exactly what kind of figure I have and therefore what shape of clothes would suit me. She also looks at the kind of colours that work best with your complexion, discusses make-up, hair style and offers wardrobe revamps, where your clothes are profoundly knocked into shape, mended, chucked or organised. And finally she also offers personal shopping, including vintage. Thanks to Zoe I make two discoveries: that Islington’s Camden Passage is an absolute vintage mecca and there is an actual shop – Equa-clothing – where you can buy ethical fashion without the traumas of shopping over the internet.

Instead we drink tea and I eat a fat slice of cake. I’ve just discovered that I’m pregnant and so the normal style rules no longer apply. Obviously I’m delighted but in a complete spin – I feel as if I’ve only just got a handle on how to look good wearing ethical clothes and now, not only will I have to find a completly new wardrobe, I’m going to have to do it on a strict budget. I imagine that stylish, ethical maternity clothes are in short supply. Zoe is calming and soothing. We discuss the minimum amount of clothes I can get away with and what kind of style I’m after. She offers helpful tips, like talking me through what I’ve got that I’ll still be able to wear later, and suggests I wear accessories round my throat, instead of necklaces and scarves that dangle down, to drawn attention away from boobs and bump.

We visit Equa-Clothing, which has a wonderful selection of clothes and very helpful staff. Zoe is the perfect person to shop with and picks out a top I’d never have looked at. It’s an indigo blue fitted smock made by Komodo – it should see me through the lumpy bit at the start of pregnancy as well as accommodate my bump and I can imagine wearing it when I’m back to my normal size too.

Back home I do some panic googling and find out that you can buy bundles of maternity clothes locally via websites like Gumtree, ebay sells millions, my local National Childbirth Trust organises sales of maternity wear and baby clothes and there’s a dress agency for maternity clothes that sells over the internet or allows you to make appointments (it’s in Berkshire: www.maternityexchange.co.uk). There are also several sites selling very basic clothes made out of bamboo, which, whilst having some eco credentials, are produced using the same toxic chemicals as viscose.

A few days later Zoe emails me a very comprehensive and thoroughly researched list, which even includes specific garments that would suit me and where I could actually buy some of them in Bristol if I don’t want to do all my shopping over the internet. I’ll attach her suggestions for those who are interested. But even if you are already stylish and not pregnant, I’d suggest that time with Zoe is worth every penny.

Zoe is offering a 20% discount on her services, including gift vouchers, between now and Christmas. Contact her via Think Style and quote Eco Chic

www.think-style.co.uk

info@think-style.co.uk

Picture is of Zoe Robinson

Ascension have just opened a new store in chic St Christopher’s Place in London. Ascension, formerly Adili, is the foremost ethical fashion website; now it’s possible to buy in the real world in a chi chi shop between Carluccio’s and Auberge, bookended by Whistles and Jigsaw.

 

Adili was founded by entrepreneurs Quentin Griffiths, part of Asos.com, and Adam Smith, who is now the CEO, in order to try and slow down fast fashion by stocking treasured pieces made with both consideration and care. The name change came about when Adili acquired Ascension, their best-selling brand, which had gone into liquidation in 2008. Adam felt that Ascension’s name was better for the company as a whole because it sounded less ‘ethical’ and ‘ethnic’.

 

Indeed, should anyone accidentally wander into the white and blond wood space, nothing would immediately scream out ‘ethical’. The current range has both men’s and women’s clothes, handbags, a smattering of accessories and silk knickers plus cosy knits by The North Circular, founded by supermodel Lily Cole and designer Izzy Lane. The own-brand Ascension range is the most affordable, with well cut long-sleeved tops, T-shirts and trousers. There are elegant Karen Cole dresses, including a Marni-esque one in navy merino with the soft feel of vintage crepe; Liberty-style prints by Annie Greenabelle in shirts and cutsie dresses, Bibico, a new range prompted by Defra’s Shared Talent India, an initiative to inspire designers to use sustainable Indian textiles and talent, funky Komodo hemp skirts, gently draping jersey by Stewart and Brown and luxury new addition, Fin. Most of the colours in the collection are muted, apart from the odd flash of red, teal or fuschia, and, of course, Ascension’s signature outfits in vibrant Indian summer coloured florals.

 

Internet clothes shopping can be hit and miss and I object to having to pay postage and postal returns: you can shell out a tenner simply for trying something on. So it is wonderful that, along with Equa-clothing  we finally have a bit of choice when shopping for sustainable fashion on the high street. If you can’t get to London, Ascension has also opened a small shop in Dorchester. But if you do visit the one in St Christopher’s Place, just remember to save a few pounds for coffee and cake at Carluccio’s.

Pictures courtesy of Ascension
 

 LFM says that since he’s moved in with me, his sports tops have started to smell. As do mine. Oh no! Is it me? Was it all the laundry trials I ran? I phone up Kerry McCarthy, the gear editor at Runner’s World, and explain my dilemma. He asks how old my running tops are and how often I wear them. I do a quick calculation. They’re about a year old and they’ve each had a minimum of 50 wears and 50 washes. “Well, what do you expect?” he says, a slight note of exasperation creeping into his voice, “A year is good going.” If I wasn’t trying to sound professional, I’d be hyperventilating right now as I think of how much it’ll cost to replace five running tops.

I report back to LFM who snorts. He means that he’s got T-shirts that are years and years old with slogans so obscure only the Great Britain masters ultimate team (this is a polite way of saying ‘older man’s frisbee’) understand them. They say things like, Chervon Action Flash, Nice Bristols, Plastic Factory. Actually, the youngest member of the team was born after LFM started playing frisbee so maybe they’re truly niche. Kerry recommends Penguin Sport-wash, which you have to buy over the internet and is expensive (£16.62 for 590ml). It works out at 92p per wash.

 

Right now we are segregating our laundry into:

• Whites with eco balls, essential lavender oil, no fabric conditioner
• LFM’s whites with normal laundry liquid, an eco fabric conditioner (which LFM objects to on the grounds of the extra chemical load) and no bloody flowery stuff
• Darks with eco balls if I get there first
• Really muddy, sweaty darks with laundry liquid
• Handwash that I chuck in on the cold cycle with Daylesford Organics.

 

And now Kerry is suggesting a further separation of sports gear to be cleaned with the very expensive Penguin Sport-Wash. No wonder the Victorians had servants and laundry rooms and they didn’t even have Lycra.

 

Apparently exercise outfits smell because detergents leave behind residues in the form of scent, brightener and fabric softener, which trap water. Bacteria grow in both the residue and the water, and make your clothes stink. Nice. Additionally, fabrics wick, breathe better, and dry faster when free of chemical residue. (Although this does not explain why eco balls, which are residue free, fail to remove sweat). Penguin Sport-Wash, it says on the website, is a ‘residue-free, non-allergenic formula designed to keep high-tech fabric at peak performance and odor-free by washing away residues left by regular detergents, removing dirt, neutralizing bacteria, and restoring breathability, moisture-wicking, and factory applied waterproofing.’ (Kerry says otherwise you have to dry your waterproofs with a hair dryer to restore the waterproofing). It is also biodegradable and removes blood and grass stains, which is also quite useful in our line of exercise. There is no indication what’s in it and the press office fails to respond to my queries. I buy a bottle from Amazon. Still no hint of what might be in it. But, hell, it’s got to be cheaper than five new running tops.

 

Sadly, it does not work. AlmaWin suggests using their concentrated laundry liquid, which, when you’re not washing your clothes, can be used to clean your car. It’s not great either. Better is Jun Wong of Yew Clothing’s suggestion of NikWax’s Base Wash, specifically designed for technical apparel.

 

Claire Macauley epitomises all that’s wrong with ethical fashion. She works incredibly hard and has designed an elegant, timeless collection made in the UK in socially responsible factories from organic fabric and wool and yet she’s struggling. “I have to lower prices,” she says. Manufacturing here in the UK is not proving viable for her brand, Anatomy: once Britain specialised in making clothes and weaving cloth yet now skills and machinery have been lost. “It can cost £85 to have a jacket sewn in a traditional British factory,” says Claire, “and when you add on the cost of materials, shipping and marketing, I’m losing money.” Claire is thinking of switching to a Lithuanian factory which does have responsible working practises but could reduce her costs as it operates on a large scale.

 

As for fabrics, she’s currently sourcing organic cotton, hemp and bamboo from America and using end of the line wool from a Scottish mill, but is finding that too few people produce organic fabric and those that do are unwilling to sell in small quantities. She’s considering continuing to use natural fibres but ones that aren’t certified organic as a way to cut costs. Then, of course, there’s the dye process. Claire has been hand dyeing the silk herself. She says, “I do everything, create the patterns, cut them out, make samples, do the ordering, track everything that is sold.” She adds, “Cost is a problem. Ethical clothes are side-lined and we should be part of fashion, we should be the icing on the cake. But the prices put people off.”

 

Claire had a varied career, starting out in a band, knocking around with legends like Joe Strummer. She worked for a costumier, formed her own company and styled for commercials before finding it all too stressful and heading to Devon where she launched her Anatomy label. Anatomy is all about tailoring, from the classic Tuxedo jacket, which looks perfect with skinny jeans or Claire’s signature cigarette pants, to the Edwardian jacket made out of bamboo denim with scarlet buttons, to my favourite, the Victorian-esque fencing jacket, which has been reinvented for spring 2010 in charmeuse (a mix of silk and hemp) with a wild fuschia lining. For next season there are playful striped blazers, pencil skirts and some clean cut tunics made of hemp linen with vintage trim. Her clothes would work both in the office or for going out with friends. “I want to be able to make a living out of this – I’ve got to make it work,” she says.

Pictures courtesy of Anatomy

In September the largest haul of Anglo-Saxon gold ever discovered in this country was dug up in Staffordshire. I suspect that future generations will not unearth anything quite so exciting; rather they will be deciphering our lifestyle from the motley collection of yoghurt pots and plastic packaging we routinely send to moulder in landfill.

 

Last month TerraCyle stepped in to try and alleviate some of this mess. The US company turns hard to recycle waste into stylish goods: in the UK they’ve just launched a new collection of totes, shoppers and planters made out of Kenco and Tassimo coffee packaging.  The idea is that we will collect and send in the packaging and be paid a handsome 2p per packet; Kraft, the company behind Kenco, will donate 2p to a UK charity and TerraCycle will transmogrify them into something useful.

 

In the states the company has collected 200 million pieces of packaging over the past three years and donated $250,000 to schools and other non-profit organisations. They don’t just stick to coffee but collect non-recyclable food wrappers, from crisp bags to cookie covers, which end up as rather cool backpacks, pencil cases and homework folders. Over a third of all US schools are involved in collecting this waste; TerraCycle pays all shipping costs and the packaging is converted in “environmentally responsible facilities” in Mexico and El Salvador. It doesn’t make sense for our waste to be shipped over there but the company is still looking for a factory in mainland Europe.

 

It’s a genius idea, a fantastic way for schools to generate income (though I’m not suggesting kids collect coffee packaging) and the CEO, college drop-out Tom Szaky, who is only 27, has just been named number one American CEO under the age of thirty by Inc. magazine. Somehow, in between all the charitable donations, the company has wracked up sales of $8 million last year. I’d describe TerraCycle’s products as geek chic – I’d like to see every school kid using them; I can imagine myself popping down to my local organic supermarket, ratcheting up street cred with my new coffee shopper - but I can’t quite see myself drinking cocktails in a bar sporting one on my arm. Still, VP Albe Zakes tells me they’ve been featured in Vogue and Glamour so perhaps I’m just not hip enough.

My brother got married this weekend.  It was a fairytale wedding: the bride looked radiantly beautiful, my brother, handsome and happy. But more importantly, what did I wear? Here I am in my ethical outfit – jewellery handed down from my mother; dress designed and made by my friend Lora, which I paid for with home-grown vegetables; jacket by Vivienne Westwood, bought on e-bay; shoes, also Vivienne Westwood, made by a traditional East End cobbler, new a good few years ago and still in pretty good nick, hand bag sewn by a local seamstress from a second-hand sari. I would have liked to wear a fascinator (fantastic word isn’t it, I’ve just discovered that’s what those twiddly bits you put in your hair at weddings are called) but can’t imagine those feathers were gathered from the hedgerows without pain to any wild fowl.

 

As for the wedding present – a set of cushion covers sewn by me. If I was gifted they might have been a breeze but instead they required much time and a deal of cussing.

 

Charity shops, vintage, e-bay, dress agencies,  making your own or borrowing a friend’s frock seems like a good way forward for those special occasions – but if you haven’t the time or inclination then I’ve got a few other suggestions. This year I’ve attended a number of weddings and have worn dresses from Enamore, From Somewhere and Karen Cole, teamed up with vintage shrugs or jackets or, in one case, a hand-me-down cardi.

 

I’d also try internet-shopping sites Ascension or Fashion Conscience; House of Tammam say they do mother-of-the-bride type outfits, not to mention the bride herself, in luxurious cream silk hand-embroidered dresses; Anatomy are bringing out a range of simple shift dresses in hemp linen with vintage fabric detailing paired with silk tailored jackets for spring 2010; Izzy Lane is fantastic for classic separates that would see you through many other formal occasions; Get Cutie do feminine frocks in riotous prints and Lowie’s cool cream knitted tea dress edged in navy only requires a cocktail and a sea breeze to turn you into Daisy out of The Great Gatsby. But if you’re really strapped for cash, take a look at The Uniform Project: even though Sheena Mathieken is wearing the same dress every day of the year, she still manages to look chic at a wedding.

Pictures copyright Sanjida O'Connell

When I worked at the BBC I had to sign a form declaring any interests. This meant, was I having a relationship, no matter how tenuous or fleeting, with anyone else in the corporation. The reason was because our boss was “involved” with one of his own researchers. In the days before transparency became a media buzz word, the irony was that our boss had to explain why we now had this new and pretty personal paperwork.

 

So, to declare an interest here, I used to be a very big fan of The Body Shop. I use their Coca Body Butter because it’s the only thing moisturising enough for my skin; the men’s deodorant because it works and I don’t like girly smells; I keep a tube of Hemp Hand protector in my handbag and a stick of lip balm on my desk. It is affordable, accessible, the products are not tested on animals and the chain pioneered what they call Community Trade – a fair wage, plus a bit – to farmers and workers in developing countries. They also used to collect empty bottles for recycling.

 

Now The Body Shop is about to launch an organic skin care range called Nutriganics. In a focus group The Body Shop asked a group of women what they thought about organic skin care products. Unfortunately, they said they smelt earthy, were a bit hippyish and wouldn’t work.

 

Nutriganics is certified organic, does not smell earthy nor look a bit hippyish. It has a pleasantly nutty, fresh smell. It contains at least 34% certified organic ingredients and community traded babussu oil from a wild grown Brazilian nut hand-picked by a women’s co-operative. Three hundred women said the creams are not sticky and are well absorbed; the night cream has been clinically proven to reduce the appearance of wrinkles. “We’re incredibly excited. It’s the first new skin care brand we’ve launched since 2005,” says Marishka Morolia, senior category and innovations manager for skin care, who, incidentally, has flawless skin.

 

I’m excited too – about a proper range of certified organic skin care that is affordable – and also at the opportunity to ask all those questions that have been niggling away and have meant The Body Shop is no longer the all time favourite beauty destination it once was for me. Before founder Anita Roddick died, The Body Shop was sold to L’Oreal. The chain’s ethical rating, as scored by Ethical Consumer, plummeted, the main reason being that L’Oreal still tests some of its ingredients on animals.

 

Marishka argues that L’Oreal has given The Body Shop more resources than the company would ever have had access to: there is a lab entirely dedicated to research into natural products, and some of the ethical products developed are infiltrating the rest of the corporation. L’Oreal’s buying power is huge, meaning deals can be pushed through that were out of The Body Shop’s league before.

 

I ask why The Body Shop uses Community Trade instead of Fairtrade. I’m always a little sceptical when companies make up their own rules instead of adhering to widely recognised standards. Their press officer points out that Fairtrade has only become applicable to beauty products this year, yet Community Trade was pioneered by The Body Shop twenty years ago.

 

Then I ask why everything has so many chemicals in – even though the company gives the appearance of being committed to ethical beauty – most products are packed full of parabens, laureth sulphates and the like – which well may be harmful to us and the environment. No one gives me a straight answer on this one, but having at least one certified organic skin care series of products shows that it can be done.

 

And for the sake of continuing to declare an interest, I also like Green People’s Vita Min Fix, Essential Care’s Avocado Replenishing Cream, Neal’s Yard Frankincense Nourishing Cream and plain old almond oil with a few drops of rose and sandalwood in it. But sadly I don’t expect that anything you buy without a prescription, wipe on your face, that’s kind to you skin and good to the environment is going to magically make your wrinkles disappear.

 

 

I first heard of John-Paul Flintoff when I read his wife Harriet Green’s hilarious article about living with the king of make do and mend. As she put it, it’s wonderful to live with a man who doesn’t call in an electrician when a plug needs a new fuse but less funny when he stops you buying a pair of J Brand jeans and offers to sew them for you himself.

 

My next encounter with J-P was when I read a blog of his in The Ecologist in which his daughter makes shoes out of cabbage leaves and he explores a bikini woven from nettles. As I’d just written a blog for The Guardian about spinning fibre from nettles too, I couldn’t help but be intrigued by his new book: Through the Eye of a Needle: The true story of a man who went searching for meaning and ended up making his Y-fronts.

 

J-P’s journey begins with him standing in a cubicle in New York in his underpants while a laser scans him, taking 200,000 measurements for a bespoke suit and ends up with him crocheting his own underpants. In his book, Harriet frequently tells him he’s not allowed out in his homemade clothes but ends with her, “grinding my jaws as I type this, it seems his time has come.”

 

I have to warn you now, Through the Eye of a Needle is utterly bonkers. It is by no means an exploration of the fashion industry by the unfashionable á  la Fred Pearce and his Confessions of an Eco Sinner. For J-P starts with his bespoke suit on the very trip to research sweatshops in New York without asking who sewed his suit, then returns to England and hires a lady in India to do his chores for him whilst paying her a pittance. Before he gets on with making his own pants, plus wearing a hat he’s woven out of a plastic bag, he explores various religions. So basically this book is a ramshackle collection of ideas the author had for newspaper features (he writes for The Sunday Times), strung like so many paper mâche beads on the string of his own life. But it is

 

a)     funny

b)     heartwarming. I do like the idea of men sewing. Most men I know would do a much better job than me if they could stop making a fuss about having a Y chromosome

c)      there is a serious message. J-P says, “There’s nothing we can do except as individuals. So my project to make an entire outfit myself is good for me and it’s good for the world. It’s good for you.”

d)      you have to love a man who asks his local seamstress to cut a paper pattern of his favourite shirt and when she asks if he’s ever made anything like this before, replies, “I made a jacket for my daughter’s teddy bear.”

“So it didn’t need fitting?”

“Well, it had to fit the bear.”

 

No wonder Vivienne Westwood said, “I don’t really understand what you’re doing but I wish you every success.”

Photo of John-Paul and his daughter Nancy, crocheting on a street corner, by Harriet Green
 

I could tell I was getting nearer to London Fashion Week’s new location at Somerset House as the heels clicking past became more insane – vertiginous, scarlet, leopard-print – and the men no longer seemed to be wearing the male uniform of untucked shirt and jeans. This is the seventh season for Estethica – the ethical bit of London Fashion Week.

 

It’s a fantastic start but still very small compared with the behemouth that is LFW. There were some exciting newcomers this season (spring/summer 2010): Ajna, soft knitwear made in Peru from alpaca and organic cotton, designed by Beryl Man, who used to work for Donna Karan; Lowie, who had the cutest thin knits in candy pink and green and retro navy and blue, and Lehee, with soft, draped tailored cuts. Christopher Raeburn, who makes parkas, jackets and dresses out of ex-military parachutes had an ethereally beautiful yet totally tough-looking collection.

 

Ethical fashion is beginning to escape from its niche: Beyond Skin are launching a capsule collection of ballet pumps in the new Anthropologie store opening in October on Regent’s St and Ciel is about to start a range within Monsoon. The Environmental Justice Foundation has a range of organic cotton T-shirts with new designs by Luella, Katharine Hamnett, Richard Nicoll and Giles Deacon. Shared Talent was shown on the Monsoon stand – a project funded by Defra and with the support of the Indian Government, showcasing UK and Indian designers, with all the garments made from sustainable Indian textiles. There are also rumours that Orsola de Castro, founder of From Somewhere and co-curator of Estethica will be making a huge splash with a large retailer later this year too. Watch this space!
 

Photo courtesy of Ciel

 

I walk, bike, box, dance, run, rock climb, and do pilates. The kind of clothes I need are probably pretty similar to the outfits the majority of us might require for most sports that don’t involve being voluntarily immersed in water. Here’s my suggestions for the best ethical brands that I’ve tried (starting with light weight activities and getting harder):

 

Gossypium

The company declined to get back to me but they were rated highest in the Ethical Consumer’s 2008 report on sportswear. Their cotton comes from small Indian, organic farms certified by SKAL, a European organic inspection agency and FLO, the worldwide Fairtrade Standard Setting and Certification Organisation, and they are committed to paying a fair wage and ensuring their factory workers have decent conditions.

I have a pair of their yoga pants, which are hard wearing and flattering and have lasted well over a decade. I wear them for light runs and pilates. However, if you’re going to do anything that’ll raise your pulse rate, don’t bother with the T-shirts. Cotton is not a great performance fabric as it chafes when wet and won’t last. Keep the Tees for normal wear.

 

www.gossypium.co.uk

 

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It’s all very well wearing the latest little dress from People Tree, organic T-shirts and shopping for vintage, but what happens when we get to the gym? Or go for a walk requiring something warm and usually waterproof? Generally exercise and outdoor gear is not known for its ethical credentials (I’m going to look at trainers another day). Whilst some clothing companies can boast a smidgeon of organic cotton, this is generally not what you want to wear for exercising. “You’re at an obvious disadvantage if you wear cotton,” says Kerry McCarthy, the gear editor at Runner’s World, “It’s not breathable, it retains moisture, it gets heavy and then hangs off your body. And the chafing causes runner’s nipple.” (Bleeding nipples for those who don’t run or wear sports bras).
 

The mainstream alternative is to wear performance fabrics that do a proper job – they don’t chafe, they wick moisture away, cool you down or keep you warm – but generally they’re made of polyester, which is a resource-hungry petrol-derived material. Kerry suggests bamboo as being the next big thing. Northface, who make outdoor clothing, declined to respond to my queries but they have launched a new line of performance wear fabric made using fast-growing bamboo that’s burnt, spun into polyester-like material and is UV-resistant, wicking, insulating and odour-beating. Sounds like a solution but unfortunately, according to the Soil Association, the process of turning bamboo into material relies on the same nasty chemicals that are used to produce viscose.

 

 

As for exercise gear’s ethical credentials… last year Ethical Consumer carried out a comprehensive report on sportswear and it’s enough to make you hang up your trainers for good. It is a litany of woe: Chinese workers paid less than half the minimum wage, forced over-time, forced labour, child labour, wages withheld, the use of PVC (which has been criticised for its environmental impact in production, use and disposal and because it contains toxic chemicals). Down, for instance, used in Berghaus sleeping bags and jackets, is plucked from live geese from the time they’re six weeks old to four years. Workers at Kappa factories, for example, had never heard of a worker’s code of conduct; workers for Timberland were coached to provide false answers to factory inspectors and had a month’s wage’s docked if they resigned; a secret pipe laid in China discharged 20,000 tonnes of waste water per day into the river system from an Adidas factory; workers for Fila complained about being made to work 24 hours straight at times of peak production. I could go on but my eyes are starting to bleed.

 

One bit of good news is that Nike has committed to blending organic cotton into its mainstream products – by 2010 the company claims its entire range of cotton clothes will contain 5% organic cotton, and has begun to incorporate recycled polyester into the rest. After being severely criticised a number of years ago, the company has fostered greater levels of transparency: you can download a list of their factories from their website, for instance, and they have developed a matrix system for evaluating the environmental impact of their products.  Next week I’ll look at the best ethical exercise gear going.

Photo copyright Sanjida O'Connell
 

Striving to be the best July/August 08 www.ethicalconsumer.org

 

Oxfam International: Offside! Labour rights and sportswear production in Asia 24 May 2006 www.oxfam.org.uk

 

A survey of leading politicians and environmental campaigners by Ethical Consumer Magazine has thrown up that throwaway fashion is one of the least ethical practices in our society and should be banned. So sewing your own is the way forward! I can now sew, after a fashion, since I’ve just done a course. I’ve got some material. I’ve even got a sewing machine. It’s my mother’s forty-year-old Singer that cost her a week and a half’s salary. It wasn’t working but finally I found a man who did not say, “Look love, just buy a new one,” but actually fixed it.

 

This is the beast I was scared of as a teenager, mainly because I didn’t know how to use it and was too impatient to listen. This was the monster I ran my first clothes up on at school – drawing round my legs in my jeans and zipping up an inner seam to create skin-tights before skinnies came into fashion, knocking up an ankle-length green skirt with a zip from hem to thigh covered with a cloud of black lace. I’m less scared now that I’ve gone to sewing school and the nice older gent showed me how to thread the beast. And the forty-year old instructions are still there!

 

 

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There is something alluring about it: it has boho chic, a touch of glamour, a glimmer of retro and almost zero guilt. Rag Trade is Bristol’s only dress agency, selling second-hand clothes on behalf of customers. Somewhere between vintage store, charity shop and ebay, dress agencies are a way of being an ethical shopper but one that takes the leg work out of bidding, selling, sifting through rails of rubbish and appeals to the average woman who doesn’t want to wear another era’s clothes.

 

“The worst thing I’ve been given was Primark – dirty Primark too,” says Cree Jones, owner of Rag Trade. What Cree specialises in are mid to high end high street and designer. The practicalities are that the profits are split 50:50 with the customer. Each garment spends four weeks at the agreed price, is then reduced by a third for two weeks, before retailing for £5-10 and finally ends up in a charity shop if still unsold. “People bring in their clothes to make money,” says Cree bluntly, “the market on ebay has changed and it’s hard to sell, particularly designer clothes, because there are a lot of fakes. People also often say, ‘I would take this to charity but it’s too nice.’” Customers can, of course, receive cash but 600 have chosen to set up an account and use their earnings to buy something new. “They don’t feel as if they’re spending and also it’s a bargain so people don’t feel as guilty,” says Cree, adding, “It’s about making decent clothes more affordable and accessible.”

 

 

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A friend of mine is buying a house. He shows me the blurb excitedly – there are two double wardrobes in the bedroom. “For her, her and a tiny bit leftover for him,” says Lovely Frisbee Man acidly. We’ve just moved in together and he still can’t get over my ‘need’ to take over most of our very large joint wardrobe. And if I’m honest, nor can I. Here I am, trying to dress ethically for a year so surely I should just accept that I have enough clothes to be warm, cool, dry, go out in, run around in, swim in, sit at my desk in and sleep in. Enough already! Yet, like most women, I can’t. I can’t quite believe that LFM only has two pairs of jeans and his out-on-the-razz-on-Friday-night outfit consists of one of them and a shirt – pretty much the same as in-on-Friday-night-with-pizza. I need more. Why? For the sake of ourselves and the planet, we ought to be able to make do with less.

I decide to ask psychiatrist Oliver James, who describes affluenza in his eponymous book as an epidemic, sweeping through the English-speaking world, an obsessive, envious malady, making us twice as prone to depression, anxiety and addictions than people in undeveloped nations.

 

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“We started out as skint teenagers who had a passion for retro clothes and wanted to look different so we used to raid charity shops and customise our own clothes,” says Annika Sanders. Anni and her then skint teen friend, Kerry Seager, started buying men’s clothes from secondhand shops and reconstructing them into experimental creations to wear out clubbing in the early nineties. The duo now have a shop, Junky Styling, in the Truman Brewery, in Shoreditch. The story of their rise from rags, to well, funky rags, is chronicled in their new book, Junky Styling, just published by A&C Black. What makes them stand out is their use of men’s suits and shirts, literally, in some cases, turning them on their heads and into tailored, figure-hugging quirkily unique designs. When I visit there’s a basque made out of a man’s suit, shirt cuffs that are now a waistcoat, a bolero that was once a pair of trousers and a dress that used to be a shirt.

 

 

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Last week I wrote about the potential environmental problems with detergents – this week is a summary of the laundry products I think are the best. I warn you now, that as a trained scientist, I am aware that I have carried out a number of shockingly unscientific and wholly subjective tests. But I have trialled many products literally for years and have recently had the help of a number of my ecologically-minded neighbours. My problem is that LFM* and I do a lot of exercise so we’re concerned with sweat and mud. I realise people with children may well be more bothered about milk vomit and grass and others might be fixated on Shiraz stains. The bottom line is that if you want totally clean, sweat-free clothes, most eco detergents don’t cut it. It’s not surprising, says Phil Patterson, a textile consultant and founder of Colour Connections. He points out that to clean clothes you need hot water, lots of it, and detergent. Modern washing machines are designed to operate with less water and at lower temperatures than they used to do, which means you’re heavily reliant on the cleaning power of your detergent. Here’s my take on the best environmentally-friendly ones:

 

Soap pods– the nut of the Indian sapindus tree. They naturally contain soap (saponin) and work pretty well. Put 5-6 in a little bag, tie firmly, use three times and then compost. A totally free option I’ve read about is to use peeled conkers.

£10.50 for 500g

 

Ecoballs – they contain mineral salts and work by ionizing oxygen, which lifts out the dirt and grime. They’ll only work if you use all three and don’t put any detergent in with them.

£34.95 for three

Ingredients: Anionic surfactants, calcium carbonate, sodium carbonate, sodium metasilicate

 

On the plus side, these are both very green options: you can reduce fabric conditioner (and don’t need it for the balls) as well as the length of the rinse cycle and you’ll be releasing almost no chemicals. Also, per wash, they’re pretty cheap – Ecozone, the manufacturer of the original ecoballs, claim that they cost 3p per wash; soap pods are meant to be 50% cheaper than conventional or alternative laundry products. The balls are made of plastic but you can refill them with mineral pellets after 1,000 laundry cycles. However, neither option shifts stubborn stains, like make-up, or ingrained sweat, and the ecoballs made the colour run in my sports tops. The laundry doesn’t have that fresh (chemically-produced smell) we’re used to; the manufacturers suggest you add essential oils. Five drops didn’t do anything, fifteen made LFM smell like a flower and stained his shirts, which didn’t go down too well (eight seems to work).

 

Ecover stain remover  - recommended to me by a number of people. You paint it onto your clothes before you stick them in the wash. The eco balls also come with a stain remover (and a 30 day money-back trial period). Ecover is not recommended for wool or silk but is supposed to remove grease and protein stains such as blood, egg, grass, mud, milk, sweat, ice cream.

£2.89 for 200ml

Ingredients: Alkyl poly glycoside C10-16, sodium lauryl ether sulfate, sodium chloride, ethanol, perfume, cellulase, citric acid, subtilisin 2-bromo-2-nitropropane-1,3-diol linalool

 

 

Daylesford organics laundry liquid (concentrated) – the ingredients are all natural, organic and are not tested on animals. The detergent smells gorgeous as it is scented with either geranium or lavender essential oils. Good for wool, silk, cold or handwash cycles – don’t expect it to get rid of dirt and sweat in a normal wash. Plus it’s relatively expensive.

£4.75 for 1 litre

Ingredients: Vegetable oil soap, aqua, glucose-derived detergent, ethanol, natural anionic detergent, citrates, citric acid, geranium oil

 

AlmaWin heavy duty laundry powder (concentrated) – this was the best of all the environmentally-friendly alternatives I’ve tried (although, in general, modern machines work better with liquids rather than powder and you need to put the powder in the drum, not the drawer). The power contains no brighteners, petrochemicals, phosphates, chlorine, bulking agents, or colour-additives. It’s not the cheapest or the most eco option (compared to pods and balls) and it does contain biological enzymes (protease). Like enzymes in any detergent they will get your clothes cleaner, but they don’t just dissolve stains, they also go to work on fabric so your clothes will not last quite as long, and some people have an allergic reaction to them. Smells quite fresh, although not of lavender, which is what it contains. AlmaWin points out that the protease enzyme is the only one on the market that is not created by genetic engineering… AlmaWin was on a par with conventional detergents like Ariel and Persil, with the added benefit of containing no nasty chemicals, fewer allergens and is not tested on animals.

£7.80 per 1kg

Ingredients: saccharoidal surfactant, fatty alcohol sulphate, vegetable soap, phyllosilicates, soda, sodium bicarbonate, sodium percarbonate, poly aspartic acid, rice starch, citric acid, natural proteases, TAED, organic lavender essential oil

 

Bio-D concentrated laundry liquid (concentrated) – this doesn’t smell great in the bottle but has a nice, fresh, faint clean smell when the clothes are laundered. Shifted both dirt and all but the very worst sweat and does not contain enzymes. Bio-D comes in a recycled plastic bottle. Junky Styling, London-based designers who create fantastic garments from old suits and shirts, warn that soap can leave a scum stain on your clothes, although I haven’t found this so far. Since the ingredients for both Bio-D and Daylesford Organics are identical (apart from the essential oils) I’m concluding that it must be the amounts of the ingredients that varies.

£3.85 per litre

Ingredients: Vegetable oil soap, aqua, glucose-derived detergent, ethanol, natural anionic detergents, citrates, citric Acid

 

Good luck!

 

*LFM – Lovely Frisbee Man

 Photo of Eco balls courtesy of Ecozone

Believe it or not, the majority of the damage your clothes do the environment is not when they’re being made but when you get hold of them. On average, a typical garment is washed twenty times and this uses six times as much energy as it did to make it in the first place. A T-shirt, for example, if washed at 60°C, tumble dried and ironed, will lead to the release of 4kg of C0² - the equivalent of flying for 17 miles. If you forgo tumble drying and don’t iron, you can cut the carbon emissions and energy consumption of your laundry by half (I hang up my tops and dresses as soon as they come out of the wash to try and minimise ironing). And as we know, washing your clothes in an A rated machine and reducing the temperature helps massively (your energy consumption is reduced by 10% for every 10^oC reduction in temperature). So reducing the temperature, reducing the number of times you wash your clothes, forgoing tumble drying and cutting back on ironing will be better for the environment - but what damage is your detergent doing?

 

It’s really hard to find out exactly what’s in your laundry detergent – manufacturers aren’t obliged to give more than a cursory nod towards the ingredients – nor is it easy to work out how damaging these chemicals are. Basically, your washing powder contains surfactants, bleaches, builders and enzymes. Surfactants are what get your clothes clean; builders are added to make surfactants work better in hard water areas, bleaches release peroxide into your washing machine to remove stains like coffee and enzymes digest stains (and your clothes too, over time). There may also be a whole host of other things as well, such as optical brighteners to make your whites look whiter, dispersing agents to hold removed dye away from the fabric and Ph adjusters that alter the acidity of the water.

 

Unsurprisingly the detergent industry firmly maintains that there is nothing wrong with the chemicals they use and equally unsurprisingly fervent greenies think there is. Overall, some of what is released from your washing machine into the sewage system is efficiently mopped up by our treatment plants. However, around a quarter of all detergents sold in Europe contain phosphates (they’re a ‘builder’) and about a quarter of all the phosphates in our waterways come from our laundry (the rest is the run-off from farming). The consequence of this is eutrophication, where water weeds and algae thrive on the excess phosphate, grow wildly, suck up all the oxygen and smother aquatic life. Plus some surfactants are broken down to a chemical called nonylphenol, which is toxic to fish and causes ‘oestrogen activity’ in mammals. Oestrogen, as you know, is the hormone that helps women grow boobs. According to The Chemistry of the Environment by Bailey, Clark, Ferris, Krause and Strong (published by Academic Press 2002), it’s not clear whether there’s enough nonylphenol in our water to be fish-killing and breast-forming.

 

But just in case – you might want to try using an eco-detergent! Unfortunately, not that many are that good – so next week I’ll let you know the results of my eco-laundry trials…and tribulations.


Photos copyright Sanjida O'Connell