Titania Inglis, winner of this year’s Ecco Domani Fashion Foundation Award in Sustainable Design, gets street cred with her first New York Fashion Week show.

The show started early for Titania Inglis. Bedecked in black – lots of stylized black – guests waited upbeat, mingling behind black curtains. It was Inglis’ inaugural New York Fashion Week show, made possible by her recently announced 2012 win of the Ecco Domani Fashion Foundation Award in Sustainable Design. It was clear that something award winning was about to take place. And, it felt as if we were part of Inglis’ cheerfully somber production. So, like good cast members we waited in the entryway of the Eyebeam Art & Technology Center, a non-profit enterprise and one of the country’s leading media art centers.

The stage was set for Inglis’ own shade of black, uplifted and far from bleak – a seamless blend of preppy plaid and gothic darkness. It was as if two, vastly separate, high school cliques instantly merged into one, very cool and non-cliquey band of fashion mavens. So, it came as no surprise when I overhead Inglis characterize her collection as “My So Called Life all grown up.”

Street-tough models bedecked in vegetable tanned leather from a farm in France, (where they guarantee the entire cow has been used, from food to fashion), in herringbone, recycled cotton plaids, asymmetrical skirts and soft fabrics like raw Japanese silk and Cupro glided by effortlessly.

Inglis, I discovered, has a special affinity to Japanese design – in part attributed to her preference for minimalism and in part, as she says, because “Japan just makes high quality textiles.  They also know how to work with the shorter organic cotton fibers in a way that we don’t in the U.S.” Despite her penchant for The East, she brings it back west with local production in New York City.

With just one month to put her show into motion after winning the prestigious 2012 Ecco Domani award, Inglis didn’t seem to cut corners.

“I wanted to create something clean, sophisticated and wearable for the everyday,” Inglis told EcoSalon. Simple as it sounds, the beauty lies in the details, like the contrast piping inside the garment and her attention to each piece’s “skeleton,” as she calls it.

When asked about her recent win, she appeared nonchalant and merely acknowledged, “My life has gotten a lot busier.”

In a show of support, last year’s Ecco Domani winner for Sustainable Design, Tara St. James of Study New York, congratulated Inglis and, as Inglis told me, offered words of caution over previous phone calls.  “The award is great, but it’s also just the start. It doesn’t guarantee you success,” Inglis paraphrases.

It may just be the beginning for the young designer, but it also feels just right.

Here are some highlights from the Titania Inglis show below:

Images: Jennifer Barckley

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Bloomingdale’s to host designer Carrie Parry’s trunk show April 14th in New York.

Designer Carrie Parry’s eponymous line was born from a passion for producing garments that never go out of style and a commitment to responsible sources and practices. This is nothing new in the sustainable design realm, but what sets Carrie Parry apart from other conscious designers is her attention to expanding the role of each piece of clothing.

According to The Green Stylist, her debut collection, “Mrs. Montague,” is based on the tailored and classic clothes designed by Adrian in the 1930s film The Women with Joan Crawford. Parry tells The Green Stylist: “The prints that I designed for the collection are inspired by the Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama and from my time as a costumier for the 1930s English traveling circus Giffords Circus.  In terms of the versatility and modularity of the designs, I was inspired by the 1830s housewife Mrs. Montague who in Troy New York invented the detachable collar.”

Increasingly, conscious fashion will not only be about the textiles and processes used, but how hard the garment itself works.

Parry says: “Each and every piece was designed with interchangeability in mind. Mixing and matching is the name of the game here, like a puzzle. Bows, cuffs, and collars can be added or subtracted at will to make some cool, and personal, looks,” and are created from an array of textiles, ranging from organic cotton and cupro, to recycled polyester.

We love her collection’s story, inspiration board and even her resume.

While designer histories don’t always fascinate, her time with design houses including Marc by Marc Jacobs, Norma Kamali, costumes for the Oscar winning film Memoirs of a Geisha and two seasons with the highly acclaimed English vintage traveling circus, Gifford’s Circus is an interesting background. At the very least, we know Parry is unique.

The designer will be kicking off a Bloomingdale’s Earth Day celebration this Thursday, April 14-Sunday, April 17, Parry with a trunk show so you can meet the designer “Behind the seams.”

Here are some featured designs for sale at the event:

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