GREEN BY DESIGN

“There’s a huge proliferation of ‘eco-labels’,” said Ryan Zinn,US campaign director for the Organic Consumers Association,“People are getting more and more confused as their consciousness continues to grow and evolve.” Even if consumers could accurately parse terms and claims such as “conflict-free”,“fair trade”,“carbon neutral”,“upcycled” and “post-consumer waste”,that’s only the beginning. Denim woven with certified organic cotton and dyed with all-natural indigo can then be bleached with caustic chemicals.

“There is a lot of green noise out there,” says Summer Rayne Oakes,an environmental activist,model and author whose new book,Style,Naturally,spends 344 pages (printed with vegetable inks on recycled paper,naturally) guiding consumers to “sustainable style” options. “Putting a logo on the label is supposed to be a kind of shorthand,but most of the ones out there are,frankly,meaningless to most consumers,” Oakes said. As consumers wait for guidelines to take hold,Oakes says,the responsibility lies with them to start buckling down before they start buttoning up. “People need to get to know their brands and what they do all along the supply chain. Stories of corporate responsibility are going to be the new prestige.”
_Adam Tschorn,LATWP

Every piece is precious
Her designs reflect a deep commitment to treating people and the planet with empathy
In the course of developing her eco- and human-friendly couture,Los Angeles-based designer Christina Kim has braved riots in Nepal,violent religious clashes in India and a nasty,brutish standoff between striking teachers and the state governor in Oaxaca,Mexico. Kim,who was born in South Korea and moved with her family to L.A. in 1971 when she was 15,sees her risk-taking odysseys as part of a deeper commitment to treating people,as well as the planet,with empathy and respect.
Kim’s fair-labour practices and preference for long-lasting garments made with recycled scraps and natural dyes over trendy,throwaway apparel treated with harmful chemicals have placed her in demand not only as a designer but also as a thinker. Time magazine named her one of its innovators of the year in 2003.
Many of Kim’s fashion creations for Dosa,her company,incorporate recycled materials collected from a variety of countries. She works with nongovernmental organisations and keeps her markups low,while attracting A-list admirers such as Nicole Kidman. Frequently,Kim employs local artisans and craftspeople whom she pays two or three times the local rate. She considers the discipline imposed by working with finite resources to be not an impediment but a spur to imagination. Recycling limits you to “essences”,she says. “To me,it’s like a symphony. The orchestration does get pretty intense.”
To illustrate,Kim pulls a jacket off the rack at her studio-factory that’s from a collection inspired by Chinese musical instruments made of lacquer. Its cuff was assembled from fabrics left over from three previous collections. The lining,made of brilliant scraps with gold predominating,has the polychrome sensuality of Gustav Klimt’s kissing lovers. Kim says of her quiltlike montages,“It’s still like it’s all one song.”
Reed Johnson,LATWP

They walk a mile in his shoes
For every pair of his canvas shoes you buy,a pair is given to a child in need
The power of shoes. It’s something most women and many men understand completely. And it is what transformed the young,shaggy-haired,rope-bracelet-wearing entrepreneur Blake Mycoskie into a visionary business leader hobnobbing with former President Bill Clinton and Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu in fewer than three years. The 32-year-old founded Toms Shoes based on the simple idea that for every pair of his canvas shoes you buy,a pair is given to a child in need.
To date,he has given away 140,000 pairs of shoes in the US,Argentina,Ethiopia and South Africa. This year,Mycoskie expects to donate 300,000 pairs of shoes,bring in $13 million in sales and work toward his goal of eradicating podoconiosis in Ethiopia,a deforming foot disease caused by walking barefoot in silica-rich soil. The shoes,featuring colourful geometric,tie-dye or glitter designs,start at $44 for men,women and children.
Mycoskie started with a college laundry service in 1997,following it up with a billboard company,which he sold to Clear Channel. A failed reality-show network was next,then a successful drivers education website. In 2002,he and his sister Paige came in third on The Amazing Race. In 2006,Mycoskie returned to Argentina for a vacation,and,in a bar,he met aid workers who were there to distribute old shoes to the needy. Mycoskie had a better idea. Why not build a business around espadrilles,he thought,selling a pair and donating a pair? He started with $500 and 250 prototypes,naming the brand Toms after the concept of shoes for “tom-orrow”.
His mind-set changed when he went on his first “shoe drop” in Argentina to distribute 10,000 pairs of shoes. “The first shoe I put on a kid’s foot,it was like,this is it. For every kid I saw,there was another I wanted to help.”
_Booth Moore,LATWP