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What is 12 Degrees?
12 Degrees is our Conscious Fashion baby. And who are we? Well one of the founders of Eco Age, Livia Firth, fashion designer Orsola de Castro, journalist Lucy Siegle and ethical fashion expert Jocelyn Whipple. Quite simply, we all feel passionately about clever design that keeps both environmental and social justice in mind while proving that fashion can have a destiny other than landfill (which is our enemy). But, in common with many fashion lovers we are all disenchanted with fast, cheap fashion and consider its impact to be not just off-putting but downright unacceptable. So we are stamping our consciously clad feet and sorting something out for ourselves (and hopefully you).
Independently we have all spent the last few years learning about and promoting ethical production and design; Orsola founded and runs Esthetica, the ethical wing of London Fashion Week which is now what we’d term a very big deal indeed ! Jos Whipple is a walking encyclopaedia on progressive fashion and has brought many of the top ethical labels to the UK, journalist, Lucy spends far too much time obsessing about sustainable style when she’s supposed to be writing it all down in a very big book and is now Visiting Professor to London College of Fashion and Livia, the Italian film producer has brought the best in eco design to the British high street and will one day conquer the entire retail world (that’s just how she is). However when it came to our own wardrobes we all found it hard to get hold of the best product. Despite the valiant work of a handful of online retailers and some designated shops, we yearned after a different shopping experience where we could feel, touch and try on the product and to learn more about the story behind the best, ethical or conscious fashion labels.
In response we came up with 12 Degrees, a year long programme of fashion and events that will ‘pop up’ instore at Eco Age in Chiswick, showcasing the best in local, national and international ethical fashion with a series of accompanying events to help shoppers learn more about what they are buying and why it makes a difference. Each month our experts have curated a ‘pop up shop’ of the best labels, in store for that month. We’re starting this month with Livia Firth’s essential picks from Esthetica . As the year progresses we’ll be bringing you the sexiest fit in organic and fairtrade denim, we’ll bring you show stopping dresses by dipping into eco couture, the softest, most beautiful and humanely sourced knitwear, wardrobe basics that will survive the end of the world and amazing accessories that will cause people to stop you on the street and offer you cash money for your handbag. All of this and more will run through to a specially curated menswear finale (a coherent look at ethical menswear is very much needed).
We really don’t mind whether you dip in and out of seasons, buy a pair of jeans, come to a Make and Mend workshop to see how to get more out of your current wardrobe, commission a recycled dress for the Oscars from one of the designers we’re showcasing or come and have a look around because you’re nosey. If you’re really committed, you might like to follow the 12 Degrees programme all the way through, building up an expertise in ethical fashion and a comprehensive guide in how to create your own ethical wardrobe. Treat it as a one off shop, a detox programme for your own wardrobe or a chance to become a fully fledged ethical fashionista. Who cares?! The whole point of 12 Degrees is that we have done the research and planning for you. All you need do is pitch up.
Sign up to our news updates and we’ll brief you on what’s coming up so you won’t miss any of our bespoke ethical fashion events. Or click on the wardrobe doors for an idea of this month’s events, themes and a guide to some of the labels that we’ll be showcasing
What is Conscious Fashion?
An enormous number of women and men love fashion and design but hate the impact of the fashion industry and the way it is has closed it eyes and ears to problems in the supply chain. Over the past decade the price of clothing has stalled or dropped while so-called fast fashion has become the foundation of the high street and most of our wardrobes. Whereas fashion used to conform to two very distinct seasons spring/summer and autumn/winter we have got used to consuming at an increasingly frenzied pace; some high street stores now effectively bring in new lines, or mini seasons every week. In short we’ve gone from two to forty seasons a year. Commentators often refer to this phenomenon as Mcfashion, the implication being that as fashion consumers we increasingly gorge on cheap, fast fashion fixes that are similar to the degradation of eating patterns through the rise of junk food.
Such criticisms of the fashion industry – that it has sped up and embraced hyper consumerism to such an extent that its very core is now threatened – can be applied to many other industries. But unlike other industries – including energy, car manufacturing and the food industry – fashion has been very slow to show its green side. Until now. Finally, parts of the industry and particular designers have realized that if fashion continues this race to the bottom, seeking out the cheapest manufacturers, fabrics and processes, exploiting biological reserves and making flimsy, ill conceived garments that may only be worn a handful of times, then in effect the industry will destroy itself.
Conscious Fashion is switched on design that takes into account its ecological and human footprint. Garments are made using a manufacturing and production cycle where workers are free from exploitation, ie they are paid a living wage for the work they have done, their rights are respected and their health and safety is enshrined through independently monitored codes of conduct. Designers are conscious of the ecological footprint of the garment and seek to minimize this through engaged, innovative and scientifically researched decisions that pick out the most benign materials and processes and consider the whole lifecycle of the piece. Fashion that takes into account social and environmental justice is also referred to as ‘ethical fashion’. It is a complex subject with lots of different avenues (one of the reasons it is such a fertile and creative new part of the fashion industry) and different designers place different emphasis on parts of the ethical jigsaw; for example, some of our designers are focused on local, heritage design, minimizing the wardrobe’s carbon footprint and re-awkening and reviving indigenous fashion skills and traditions while others see the conscious fashion market as a chance to address poverty in parts of the developing world, providing access to market for communities and cooperatives who would ordinarily be squashed by the relentless march of globalised, homogenized fashion labels and brands. 12 Degrees brings you all sides of the Conscious Fashion argument.
Feel good fashion.
When you buy a piece from 12 Degrees you can be sure that we have made every effort to account for its ecological footprint and ethical manufacturing chain. The designers we work with really do spend hours consulting with homeworkers in Southern India to re-ignite and bring to market extraordinary embellishment techniques, have geo-scientific knowledge of the Alashan Plane and negotiate with goatherds descended from Gengis Khan. They really do rescue and rehome sheep and rediscover naturally dyeing techniques to protect watercourses. They are unbelievably passionate and in some cases deranged. In many cases they are revolutionizing fashion from the fields and mills through to the cutting table. But the pieces we will bring to our pop up shop do not look at all worthy. They are about beautiful, conscious fashion, not necessarily slogans and fist waving.
British consumers spend a lot of money on fashion. Research suggests that despite the recession, we will continue to spend. We would prefer that you got true value for money. Conscious fashion is feel good fashion because you can enjoy wearing it without the nagging possibility that it was made in a sweatshop or drenched in pesticides.
Why do we need to wake up about fashion?
12 Degrees is all about creating a positive wardrobe and telling the magical story of Conscious Fashion. However, by accentuating the positive, we inevitably shine a light on the conventional fashion industry and its practices. We try not to go overboard on this (there’s enough doom and gloom in the world) but here are some sobering facts:
We are buying too fast and treating cheap fashion as if it was disposable. According to a new survey released by climate change charity, Global Cool over half of all the clothes, shoes and accessories bought by British women during 2008 have not been worn. A survey of 3,500 UK women revealed that on average £470 was spent on items in 2008 that were never worn – an estimated UK total of £11.1 billion. To add insult to injury, one in ten women confessed that they chucked their unworn items straight in the bin.
Statistics show that we throw away two million tonnes of textiles into landfill every year. Not only does this sit there creating greenhouse gas emissions but think of all the oil, energy, water etc that went into producing these textiles that are now lost forever. Out of the 300,000 tonnes of fashion waste collected annually in the UK for reuse and reprocessing, only about 52 per cent is good enough quality to be sold on, down from 60 per cent a couple of year’s ago. 10 per cent will have to industry for use as car seat filler or wiping rags for machines. A sad end for unwanted fashion.
Fashion also employs 14 per cent of the global workforce. It is an extremely important industry. However as poverty becomes even more entrenched with rising commodity prices and the spector of climate change which disproportionately affects poor communities, it is crucial that these people are safeguarded. Millions of people work in fashion worldwide who are paid less than a living wage, and whose rights are unprotected as they work in conditions that are legally unacceptable in the west.
Sadly the trend for cheap, fast fashion means that fashion’s footprint is becoming larger and threatening more habitats and communities. Unfortunately the race for ever cheaper, faster production has meant a regressive return to old and polluting practices (such as a recent trend for older, more polluting synthetic dyes).
12 Degrees wants to show an alternative to these destructive trends.
Don’t be afraid of ethical fashion.
Above all, we want to show how progressive and well designed ethical fashion can be. If you were afraid that green meant hairy hippie aesthetic and socks worn with sandals, 12 Degrees presents a complete antidote. This is a design meritocracy, where we’ve chosen on merit not by how much tofu the designer has eaten. Prepare to see beautiful cuts, superior fabrics, flattering design and all the bonuses that thought through, intelligent design can bring. These are not pieces with a short lifespan, but wardrobe stars that you will love and cherish.
12 Degrees is our Conscious Fashion baby. And who are we? Well one of the founders of Eco Age, Livia Firth, fashion designer Orsola de Castro, journalist Lucy Siegle and ethical fashion expert Jocelyn Whipple. Quite simply, we all feel passionately about clever design that keeps both environmental and social justice in mind while proving that fashion can have a destiny other than landfill (which is our enemy). But, in common with many fashion lovers we are all disenchanted with fast, cheap fashion and consider its impact to be not just off-putting but downright unacceptable. So we are stamping our consciously clad feet and sorting something out for ourselves (and hopefully you).
Independently we have all spent the last few years learning about and promoting ethical production and design; Orsola founded and runs Esthetica, the ethical wing of London Fashion Week which is now what we’d term a very big deal indeed ! Jos Whipple is a walking encyclopaedia on progressive fashion and has brought many of the top ethical labels to the UK, journalist, Lucy spends far too much time obsessing about sustainable style when she’s supposed to be writing it all down in a very big book and is now Visiting Professor to London College of Fashion and Livia, the Italian film producer has brought the best in eco design to the British high street and will one day conquer the entire retail world (that’s just how she is). However when it came to our own wardrobes we all found it hard to get hold of the best product. Despite the valiant work of a handful of online retailers and some designated shops, we yearned after a different shopping experience where we could feel, touch and try on the product and to learn more about the story behind the best, ethical or conscious fashion labels.
In response we came up with 12 Degrees, a year long programme of fashion and events that will ‘pop up’ instore at Eco Age in Chiswick, showcasing the best in local, national and international ethical fashion with a series of accompanying events to help shoppers learn more about what they are buying and why it makes a difference. Each month our experts have curated a ‘pop up shop’ of the best labels, in store for that month. We’re starting this month with Livia Firth’s essential picks from Esthetica . As the year progresses we’ll be bringing you the sexiest fit in organic and fairtrade denim, we’ll bring you show stopping dresses by dipping into eco couture, the softest, most beautiful and humanely sourced knitwear, wardrobe basics that will survive the end of the world and amazing accessories that will cause people to stop you on the street and offer you cash money for your handbag. All of this and more will run through to a specially curated menswear finale (a coherent look at ethical menswear is very much needed).
We really don’t mind whether you dip in and out of seasons, buy a pair of jeans, come to a Make and Mend workshop to see how to get more out of your current wardrobe, commission a recycled dress for the Oscars from one of the designers we’re showcasing or come and have a look around because you’re nosey. If you’re really committed, you might like to follow the 12 Degrees programme all the way through, building up an expertise in ethical fashion and a comprehensive guide in how to create your own ethical wardrobe. Treat it as a one off shop, a detox programme for your own wardrobe or a chance to become a fully fledged ethical fashionista. Who cares?! The whole point of 12 Degrees is that we have done the research and planning for you. All you need do is pitch up.
Sign up to our news updates and we’ll brief you on what’s coming up so you won’t miss any of our bespoke ethical fashion events. Or click on the wardrobe doors for an idea of this month’s events, themes and a guide to some of the labels that we’ll be showcasing
What is Conscious Fashion?
An enormous number of women and men love fashion and design but hate the impact of the fashion industry and the way it is has closed it eyes and ears to problems in the supply chain. Over the past decade the price of clothing has stalled or dropped while so-called fast fashion has become the foundation of the high street and most of our wardrobes. Whereas fashion used to conform to two very distinct seasons spring/summer and autumn/winter we have got used to consuming at an increasingly frenzied pace; some high street stores now effectively bring in new lines, or mini seasons every week. In short we’ve gone from two to forty seasons a year. Commentators often refer to this phenomenon as Mcfashion, the implication being that as fashion consumers we increasingly gorge on cheap, fast fashion fixes that are similar to the degradation of eating patterns through the rise of junk food.
Such criticisms of the fashion industry – that it has sped up and embraced hyper consumerism to such an extent that its very core is now threatened – can be applied to many other industries. But unlike other industries – including energy, car manufacturing and the food industry – fashion has been very slow to show its green side. Until now. Finally, parts of the industry and particular designers have realized that if fashion continues this race to the bottom, seeking out the cheapest manufacturers, fabrics and processes, exploiting biological reserves and making flimsy, ill conceived garments that may only be worn a handful of times, then in effect the industry will destroy itself.
Conscious Fashion is switched on design that takes into account its ecological and human footprint. Garments are made using a manufacturing and production cycle where workers are free from exploitation, ie they are paid a living wage for the work they have done, their rights are respected and their health and safety is enshrined through independently monitored codes of conduct. Designers are conscious of the ecological footprint of the garment and seek to minimize this through engaged, innovative and scientifically researched decisions that pick out the most benign materials and processes and consider the whole lifecycle of the piece. Fashion that takes into account social and environmental justice is also referred to as ‘ethical fashion’. It is a complex subject with lots of different avenues (one of the reasons it is such a fertile and creative new part of the fashion industry) and different designers place different emphasis on parts of the ethical jigsaw; for example, some of our designers are focused on local, heritage design, minimizing the wardrobe’s carbon footprint and re-awkening and reviving indigenous fashion skills and traditions while others see the conscious fashion market as a chance to address poverty in parts of the developing world, providing access to market for communities and cooperatives who would ordinarily be squashed by the relentless march of globalised, homogenized fashion labels and brands. 12 Degrees brings you all sides of the Conscious Fashion argument.
Feel good fashion.
When you buy a piece from 12 Degrees you can be sure that we have made every effort to account for its ecological footprint and ethical manufacturing chain. The designers we work with really do spend hours consulting with homeworkers in Southern India to re-ignite and bring to market extraordinary embellishment techniques, have geo-scientific knowledge of the Alashan Plane and negotiate with goatherds descended from Gengis Khan. They really do rescue and rehome sheep and rediscover naturally dyeing techniques to protect watercourses. They are unbelievably passionate and in some cases deranged. In many cases they are revolutionizing fashion from the fields and mills through to the cutting table. But the pieces we will bring to our pop up shop do not look at all worthy. They are about beautiful, conscious fashion, not necessarily slogans and fist waving.
British consumers spend a lot of money on fashion. Research suggests that despite the recession, we will continue to spend. We would prefer that you got true value for money. Conscious fashion is feel good fashion because you can enjoy wearing it without the nagging possibility that it was made in a sweatshop or drenched in pesticides.
Why do we need to wake up about fashion?
12 Degrees is all about creating a positive wardrobe and telling the magical story of Conscious Fashion. However, by accentuating the positive, we inevitably shine a light on the conventional fashion industry and its practices. We try not to go overboard on this (there’s enough doom and gloom in the world) but here are some sobering facts:
We are buying too fast and treating cheap fashion as if it was disposable. According to a new survey released by climate change charity, Global Cool over half of all the clothes, shoes and accessories bought by British women during 2008 have not been worn. A survey of 3,500 UK women revealed that on average £470 was spent on items in 2008 that were never worn – an estimated UK total of £11.1 billion. To add insult to injury, one in ten women confessed that they chucked their unworn items straight in the bin.
Statistics show that we throw away two million tonnes of textiles into landfill every year. Not only does this sit there creating greenhouse gas emissions but think of all the oil, energy, water etc that went into producing these textiles that are now lost forever. Out of the 300,000 tonnes of fashion waste collected annually in the UK for reuse and reprocessing, only about 52 per cent is good enough quality to be sold on, down from 60 per cent a couple of year’s ago. 10 per cent will have to industry for use as car seat filler or wiping rags for machines. A sad end for unwanted fashion.
Fashion also employs 14 per cent of the global workforce. It is an extremely important industry. However as poverty becomes even more entrenched with rising commodity prices and the spector of climate change which disproportionately affects poor communities, it is crucial that these people are safeguarded. Millions of people work in fashion worldwide who are paid less than a living wage, and whose rights are unprotected as they work in conditions that are legally unacceptable in the west.
Sadly the trend for cheap, fast fashion means that fashion’s footprint is becoming larger and threatening more habitats and communities. Unfortunately the race for ever cheaper, faster production has meant a regressive return to old and polluting practices (such as a recent trend for older, more polluting synthetic dyes).
12 Degrees wants to show an alternative to these destructive trends.
Don’t be afraid of ethical fashion.
Above all, we want to show how progressive and well designed ethical fashion can be. If you were afraid that green meant hairy hippie aesthetic and socks worn with sandals, 12 Degrees presents a complete antidote. This is a design meritocracy, where we’ve chosen on merit not by how much tofu the designer has eaten. Prepare to see beautiful cuts, superior fabrics, flattering design and all the bonuses that thought through, intelligent design can bring. These are not pieces with a short lifespan, but wardrobe stars that you will love and cherish.
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