With new collections of both eco-friendly shoes and sunglasses, as well as an increasing commitment to greening some of their practices, could Gucci emerge as the high-fashion leader in sustainability?

Even though it seems like a no-brainer, sustainability practices have not yet had a big breakthrough at the high-fashion houses of the world. However, with two recent product launches and an increasing commitment to eco-friendly practices, it seems like Gucci is starting to put some focus on sustainability.

On the heels of the Copenhagen Fashion Summit, Gucci came out with a new eco-friendly line of shoes. Named “Sustainable Soles” and designed by Gucci Creative Director Frida Giannini, the shoes are made from biodegradable plastic, not unlike the material used by Brazilian shoemaker Melissa, sourced from compost. The line includes two styles – the Marola Green ballerina flat for women featuring cutout details and a signature GG logo and comes in a variety of colors, while the California Green men’s sneaker comes in a low- and high-top version and features bio-rubber soles, vegetable-tanned calf skin, bio laces and recycled polyester.

After producing a small range of sustainably made eyewear in collaboration with Safilo last year, it seems that Gucci has renewed the commitment to environmentally friendly sunglasses with a new collection, made from liquid wood. It’s the first time this innovative biodegradable material has been used in sunglasses. Made from bio-based materials – wood fiber from sustainably managed forests, lignin from the paper manufacturing process and natural wax – liquid wood is a great alternative to the plastic that is so frequently used in eyewear. The cases were also designed for space and weight efficiency, which cuts carbon emissions from transport by 60%.

Two years ago, in June 2010, Gucci dipped their toes in the sustainability bucket by launching a completely new range of packaging, also created by Frida Giannini, that is 100% recyclable. The plastic laminated surfaces that are so commonly seen on high-fashion shopping bags were replaced with a more subtle beater-dyed paper de-bossed with Gucci’s famous GG logo, and the paper used to create the bags is sourced only from certified forests. On the recently launched Creative Sustainability Lab on PPR’s main website, Gucci states that they will continue to push for “the use of other biodegradable materials, such as corn, bamboo and cotton.”

Gucci is also gradually replacing printed materials with e-cards and e-catalogues, and new transportation policies have reduced the use of trucks by 30%. Also, each new Gucci mannequin will be made in Italy, from 100% recyclable polystyrene that is 100% recyclable and finished with water based paints. Patrizio di Marco, President and CEO of Gucci, said “The world’s leading brands are rightly judged today, not just on the quality of their products and services, but also on the way they act in the community and towards the environment.”

Sure, there’s a lot more that Gucci could, and should do when it comes to sustainability, but it all has to start somewhere. We can only hope that these efforts are the start of something bigger.

The post Gucci’s Fashionable Commitment to Sustainability appeared first on EcoSalon.

Jeesh. Yesterday I was flooded with friends’ and colleagues’ emails begging me to write a rebuttal to what they thought were one or two writers slamming the eco-fashion industry.

It had already gone pretty viral by the time the emails came in and only this morning did I really take note. Sometimes knee-jerk reactions can prove disastrous, even if you want to be the first to herald the crappy news and the news is simply: nobody knows what eco-fashion is. Big deal.

For those of you who care what I have to think about eco-fashion, here it is:

Eco-fashion is a veritable hell mess defined sadly and mostly by archaic industry professionals who like the game to work for them.

It’s also called self-serving eco-branding.

Greenwashing? No.
Survival? Yes.
You know who you are.

Note that I wrote “mostly.”
The people interviewed in the first article, which debuted in Financial Times, were fantastic representatives of the “mostly.”

Here’s how FT’s writer Vanessa Friedman quoted them as defining eco-fashion:

Frida Giannini, Gucci creative director: “Quality items that stand the test of time – it is this concept of sustainability, symbolised by a timeless handbag that you wear again and again, and can pass on, that I am always thinking of when I design.”

Oscar de la Renta, designer, brand founder: “Sustainable fashion implies a commitment to the traditional techniques, and not just the art, of making clothes. I work today in the same way that I first learnt in the ateliers of Balenciaga and Lanvin 50 years ago. We need to ensure that the next generation of seamstresses and tailors have the skills necessary to develop clothes that are not only beautiful but extremely well made.”

Anya Hindmarch, designer, brand founder, and initiator of the “I am not a plastic bag” initiative: “I would define the ideal as locally sourced materials that don’t pollute in their creation or demise (preferably recycled) and with limited transportation to achieve the completed product.”

And, lastly, designer and brand founder Dries van Noten: “Most of what we may currently refer to as sustainable fashion is a contradiction in terms. It refers to how the fabric used for a new garment has been produced … Yet, I believe, we need to consider this issue from a more macro and profound perspective. Though a cotton may be unbleached, we need to examine how it arrives to the manufacturer or to us the wearer. What was the “˜carbon imprint’ of its delivery, for example?”
Not all the same, then.”

I agree with all of these responses.

But, please understand that these designers are so far removed from their lines. They do not design their lines, their designers design the lines and their marketing professionals decide which campaign could benefit them. And the flavor of the year, for them, is light green.

They are too big to care what the hell eco-fashion is, so they invent off-the-cuff definitions to support the little they do to contribute to this new, darker green world.

(Next time, Vanessa, call me and I’ll give you a different list for interviews.)

These fashion giants – minus Ms. Hindmarch – have a lot of money and could be doing a lot more, by the way, than using “traditional” techniques. As for the others, the not “mostly’s” who live and breathe what it takes to be sustainably designing, there aren’t enough sermons in the world to dedicate to you.

They are smaller design houses, independents, creating from small studios all over the world.

They are supported by indie boutiques all over the world.

They are broke.

They are struggling to be artists, to make really beautiful clothing from organic materials. They are juggling their lines by being coffee baristas and part-time brokers.

They are not necessarily committed to, as Maria Moyer, one of my favorite new people recently said, “Picking a lane.”

What this means is that these same designers, first and foremost, need to design. If they can then use an organic fabric, cut down their carbon footprint, give percentages to the homeless, work with water-based dyes, incorporate alternative energy at their facilities, manufacture locally and make it in the U.S. well, all the better. But designers must first design.

When they focus on that, they are able to create objects of worth that transcend trends and can be used not only to satisfy our urge to adorn but to outlast so we don’t need more.
We, the consumers, also need to be more conscious of what we buy. We play a big part in this, too.

When writers proclaim prematurely that “nobody knows what eco-fashion is,” they fail to realize it’s just more fuel on our fire.

That it only makes our community stronger and more willing to design sustainably because it does matter so much for our health and for the environment.

Because this isn’t just about defining eco-fashion. This is about conscious consumption, and we Americans know nothing of it.

Therein lies our eco-fashion paradox.

Our own fashion burden to bear.

Image: CoCreatr’s

The post Self-Serving Ecoists, Mostly appeared first on EcoSalon.