Fashioning trade: local marketers converting kids’s style

There aren’t many amongst us who can say they don’t like an awesome good buy. It’s a herbal intuition to need to get the great bang for your greenback. So whilst low-price fashion started to take over the excessive street back inside the 1990s, buyers have been of their element. Now they may update their wardrobes on an nearly weekly basis and without a doubt discard gadgets once they (quick) went out of favor.

 

But somewhere behind our minds we knew it was too properly to be authentic. There needed to be a flipside. And there was, but while reviews commenced to emerge about poor situations for manufacturing facility people and environmental worries, nevertheless we saved on shopping for, trapped in a throw-away subculture – surely our person purchases weren’t part of the problem?

Then came the Rana Plaza catastrophe in Bangladesh in 2013, wherein over 1,a hundred human beings died and another 2,500 were injured whilst a manufacturing facility constructing collapsed. The world started out to sit up and take word. The human value became actual; rapid style had a dark aspect.

Jump forward to 2016 and another stunning side to the tale came to light with the release of Canadian documentary RiverBlue. This time, for Hong Kong, it changed into even towards home. Those cheap denims we’d all been buying were polluting rivers, like the Pearl River in China with chemical substances and dyes. What wasn’t pumped into the rivers remained inside the fabric, equipped for us to wear.

All in all, it makes for a quite miserable examine, however the excellent news is that the publicity has placed stress at the large-name manufacturers to smooth up their acts. The Bangladesh Accord, which ambitions to assist prepared-made garment factories in Bangladesh grow to be – and live – safe for thousands and thousands of workers become introduced into effect in April 2013 and changed into signed by way of important companies inclusive of H&M, Primark and Arcadia Group.

Here in DB, we’re quite aware about the effect people are having on earth. We see the trash in the sea and the smog in the air, and we need things to change. Not handiest can we want a higher the next day for our children, we need a higher these days.

It’s this force that is behind a upward thrust in moral childrenswear shops across Hong Kong. In truth, as it seems, we’ve some splendid on line options right here on our doorstep.

Healthy, sustainable socks

First up is Eureka Bamboo Socks – a DB-primarily based eco-aware enterprise devoted to growing stylish socks that aren’t most effective produced ethically but also are wholesome to put on.

According to co-proprietor and two-12 months resident Darren Counsell desire of cloth have to be one of the key considerations for dad and mom whilst choosing garments for his or her kids.

“Much like you’re acutely aware of the meals which you eat and the water you drink, you want to be aware of clothing cloth – it can contain masses of harmful chemical compounds and pollution,” he explains. “So, try to make sure the goods that spend quite a few time in opposition to your youngsters’s pores and skin – most significantly socks and underwear – are ‘health pleasant.’

“Eureka uses bamboo as its predominant material because it is hypoallergenic. The green fibres are a great deal gentler at the skin than man-made fibres, and they’re additionally antibacterial, antifungal and odour resistant. Furthermore, bamboo can be one hundred% organically grown, so there are not any traces of pesticides. Our production partners all have the OEKO-TEX® Standard 100 certificate – this is the fine recognised, impartial, worldwide certification for textiles examined for dangerous materials.”

Darren is going on to provide an explanation for that bamboo is the quickest growing plant on earth – it’s an without difficulty renewable useful resource, and it can resist water shortages, requiring two thirds much less water than cotton to develop. “Importantly too, bamboo releases 30% extra oxygen into the environment and absorbs extra carbon dioxide than other plants, so it decreases greenhouse gases whilst cleansing the air.”

Another local label leading the manner for sustainable kids’ fashion is ‘felix & mina,’ owned by way of Peng Chaubased mum Jun Li-Friese. Catering to girls and boys aged one to 6, the logo is named after Jun’s son, Felix, and his cousin, Mina.

Driven through its motto of ‘Live the instant, stay with focus,’ the logo concept was dreamt up in 2002 with the intention of making fashionable childrenswear that is also secure for children and the surroundings. The range consists of a laugh, purposeful portions made from stretchy, breathable fabrics in designs that appeal to parents and youngsters alike.

Jun says that the way the garments are produced is a key detail of felix & mina’s ethos. “We use a lot of Turkish cotton, that’s especially smooth,” she says. “This ensures that the garments are lightweight, fastdrying and splendid flexible. It’s additionally absolutely natural, which allows to avoid problems with skin allergies. Ours is a completely strict manufacturing approach. All of our organic cotton collection meet the European Union’s Global Organic Textile Standard (GOTS) rules.”

Jun says that the organic element doesn’t imply you need to compromise on fashion either. “Usually substances which can be eco-friendly are not very colourful, however we use natural dyes, so we’re capable of provide bright merchandise which might be nevertheless safe for the environment. We offer free shipping within DB too, so it’s fantastic handy for DBers to shop with us.”

A reusable cloth wardrobe

Of route, one of the troubles about making children’ fashion sustainable is how quickly they develop out of things. Sure, you can make an effort to store responsibly, however what do you do with the matters that not suit?

According to non-profit employer Remake, most of our discarded clothes come to be being incinerated or sent to landfills, and they estimate that items product of nonbiodegradable fabrics, which is most of the clothing we very own, can sit down in landfills for as much as 200 years.

That changed into the difficulty Sarah Garner had in mind while she set up her apparel business Retykle, which gives a reselling service for midto excessive-cease childrenswear. A ordinary on the Handmade Hong Kong markets in DB, Sarah says the inspiration for the enterprise got here from her astonishment at how rapid her first toddler, Henry, changed into outgrowing his garb, and she or he desired to discover a solution.

The concept at the back of Retykle is easy: mother and father fill a bag with clothes which can be both new (we’ve all were given the ones gadgets behind the dresser someplace) or in ‘gently used’ circumstance and both set up a loose pick out up from home or drop them at the Retykle studio in Wong Chuk Hang. Sarah’s crew then adds the gadgets to their catalogue and sells them on-line, with 50% of the revenue going to the seller.

It’s a win-win, removing the hassle for the sellers, even as giving buyers the opportunity to enjoy large savings on nice brands. And once the items were outgrown another time, in the event that they still meet the Retykle standards, they could go returned into the cycle.

According to UK charity WRAP (Waste and Resources Action Plan), firms throughout the deliver chain should split to a few% in their carbon, water and waste impact with the aid of making clothes that remaining simply three months longer.

“The biggest troubles we are dealing with in fashion are cheaper and quicker garb manufacturing and overconsumption,” says Sarah. “The single largest approach to our fashion crisis is to preserve our objects in move for longer and buy less new stuff.”