People Tree Talks Ethical Fashion’s Evolution
Fashion circularity is a very real possibility and ethical fashion leaders, including People Tree, are enabling consumers to build up more sustainable wardrobes.
Founded in 1991 by Safia Minney, the London-based fashion retailer designs apparel for minimal environmental impact by incorporating sustainable materials, protecting garment workers and equipping consumers with the garments they need for eco-conscious styling.
The aim, for People Tree, is to elevate ethical fashion. And the timing is right as consumers continue to demand information about who made their clothes, if the workers making the clothes were paid a fair wage and how that apparel production is affected the environment overall.
People Tree currently uses eco-friendly materials, including organic cotton and TENCEL™ branded lyocell fibers derived from wood pulp in a closed loop system, in its women’s apparel lineup. For more than 25 years, People Tree has collaborated with Fair Trade cotton farmers, artisans and garment workers, to ensure transparency, fair wages and treatment of individuals involved in its supply chain. What’s more, the company also informs consumers about the environmental markup of their garments so they can assess their contributions to a more circular fashion future.
As the world’s first apparel company to achieve GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard) and receive the World Fair Trade Organization’s Fair Trade Product Mark, industry members can take cues from People Tree on how to improve fashion’s environmental stance.
Carved in Blue caught up with Minney to discuss ethical fashion’s evolution, eco-friendly material alternatives and what it is really going to take for the industry and consumers to ramp up fashion circularity in upcoming years.
Safia joined Sven Segal at Po-Zu in 2017 to help turn the award winning ethical footwear company into a global brand bringing her experience in building ethical supply chains and ethical brands.
Carved in Blue: What does sustainability mean to you?
Safia: It means living lightly and with respect to the planet and people that make the products and services that we consume every day. We should be respectful of animals too. Making less fashion, with more value-added in each piece of clothing or footwear. Using sustainable and natural materials throughout and making clothes that will eventually biodegrade.
We are buying and washing clothes too much. (In Japan where I lived for nearly 20 years, we wash clothes in eco soaps and in cold water). Also, we should buy second hand more, fix the clothes we love and rent beautiful clothes for special occasions. Wear the Walk is an amazing company. There are so many other, important things to care of to improve society – how we look is costing us our physical and psychological health. Fashion needs to learn humility.
Carved in Blue: Why do you think sustainability is finally getting more attention in the apparel industry?
Safia: Sustainability issues like climate change, water scarcity and soil erosion are now effecting every part of our planet and our human activities, only idiots deny them today. The SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) are being put into policy on sourcing by companies as a matter of survival, not just because it is the right thing to do.
Carved in Blue: What kind of materials are you most interested in for their sustainable properties?
Safia: I have always wanted natural fibers and fabrics, as they are fully biodegradable. Unlike synthetics, like nylon, acrylic, polyester etc., natural fibers washed into the environment breakdown quickly, whereas fibers from synthetics, take hundreds of years. These plastic micro fibers enter the food chain as they are infested by fish, and end up in our food as well as the tap water that we drink. As if pollution through garment industry dyes and chemical finishes is not bad enough?
Carved in Blue: How have eco fibers and textiles made their way to denim?
Safia: People Tree does a great collaboration with Lee denim where we use 100 percent organic and FT [Fair Trade] cotton and safe dyes and no environmentally unfriendly finishes. I am pleased to see other brands using organic cotton and repairing denim. Pre-loved denim always looks great!
Carved in Blue: What do you think is next for the denim industry?
Safia: I think paying denim garment workers a living wage would be brilliant! Only half of them are paid a minimum wage in Bangladesh—I don’t think clothing should be built on modern day slavery, do you?
Carved in Blue: What’s missing from the denim industry today?
Safia: Human rights and sustainable levels of production. Our planet cannot bear the toll of human activity and sustain the human population. The choice is ours: slow down and find ways to live sustainably or face the breakdown of our eco-system and famine. The fashion and fiber industry needs to be held accountable for its responsibility in wrecking the future of human existence.
Carved in Blue: What’s your favorite city for ethical fashion inspiration?
Safia: Amsterdam. Some times when I visit, I want to stay there forever!