UK Designers Merge Eco-Responsibility with Timeless Style
Designers showing at this year's London Fashion Week showed off their sustainable designs on Thursday at the headquarters of the British Fashion Council.
The event fused fashion and film, culminating in the creation of eight eco-friendly evening gowns. The designers were Stella McCartney, Jonathan Saunders,
Alice Temperley, and milliner Stephen Jones.
This pre-Fashion Week show is part of an initiative co-founded by Livia Firth, wife of Oscar winning actor Colin Firth.
The designers were given a film to re-interpret - in a sustainable way.
Despite each of the designers being well established in their field, some did say the task was a challenge.
British designer Alice Temperley says it's 'fast fashion' that is the most damaging.
[Alice Temperley, Designer]:
''There's things that will never make fashion particularly green, and I think the most important thing is to make collections that are timeless and pieces that you can wear over and over again. [...] And I think fast fashion is probably the most damaging, delivering things, making things, there's waste delivering those things and made in bad conditions and hundreds of thousands of garments and people buy four or five of them and then dispose of them and that is the worst, fast fashion is the most damaging.''
Award winning Scottish designer Jonathan Saunders says the rules set by Firth and her partners didn't limit his creativity.
[Jonathan Saunders, Designer] :
''What this project has enabled, enabled designers to do is to express themselves and using those materials without it even becoming an issue and you know it isn't even a compromise as such, and I think that it's important for us all to associate things like that with luxury, you know. Because I think in the past it hasn't been and I think it's important that the two can work hand in hand.”
The sustainable evening gowns are on display at the British Fashion Council as part of the sustainable initiative Estethica.
