Scientists from Bristol University in the United Kingdom have discovered a way to clean up oil spills without leaving behind a mass of suds. Derived from iron-rich salts dissolved in water, the “magnetic soap” can be manipulated through simple magnetic forces rather than physical or chemical means. Although the surfactant is still highly experimental, the research raises the possibility of slick-neutralizing detergents that can be removed from sensitive environments once the job is done.
Are you guilty of chucking aside the sweaters your granny gives you every winter? The Canadian arm of World Wildlife Fund wants you to be a dear and dig those dusty jumpers out of your closet for National Sweater Day on February 9. Sponsored by Loblaw, the Great White North’s largest food retailer, the event is part of a nationwide movement to encourage Canadians to turn down the heat and “turn up a sweater,” instead. Lowering your thermostat by just one degree throughout the year will reduce your carbon-dioxide emissions by 100 kilograms—that’s 220 pounds for the non-metrically inclined—or the weight of a baby hippopotamus, according to WWF-Canada. Need a little friendly prodding? Book a call with one of the dozen actual grannies who are standing by to nag remind you.
The maker of Brazilian Blowout, a popular line of “professional-only” hair-straightening products, has agreed to warn consumers that two of its formulations emit formaldehyde gas—a known carcinogen—according to California’s attorney general on Monday. As the first law enforcement action under California’s Safe Cosmetics Act, the settlement agreement, which includes $600,000 in penalties and fines, has been a long time coming. In August, after investigating inquiries from consumers and salon professionals about the safety of the products, the U.S. Food and Health Administration slapped Brazilian Blowout with a notice of safety and labeling violations. Following that, the Occupational Safety and Health Adminstration issued a notice to salon owners and workers about potential formaldehyde exposure from working with the products, which are reportedly popular with celebrities like Jennifer Aniston, Halle Berry, and Nicole Richie.
Just when you thought TOMS couldn’t get any more awesome, the philanthropic shoe-and-eyeglass company is launching a line of cute-as-heck ballet flats, just in time for spring. Guaranteed to put a bounce in your step once the frost thaws, the comfy looking slip-ons come in an array of solids and on-trend prints (funky leopard or lively indigenous weave, anyone?) in leather, suede, linen, burlap, chambray, or woven canvas. And if there wasn’t already plenty to love, for every pair you buy, TOMS will donate a pair of shoes to a child in need. We’re getting happy feet just thinking about it.
From odor-absorbing underpants to bacteria-resistant appliances, silver nanoparticles are on the cutting edge of antimicrobial technology. But although the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has “conditionally registered” the disinfectant as a preservative for textiles such as clothing, baby blankets, and pillow cases, the Natural Resources Defense Council wants to ban the product entirely. The “conditional” clause means that the EPA requires further toxicity data but is allowing the pesticide on the market anyway, explains Jennifer Sass, a senior scientist at the NRDC, on her blog. HeiQ, the Swiss manufacturer behind several nanosilver products, has four years to prove that the substance will not cause “unreasonable adverse effects on human health or the environment,” she adds. “Four years!”
Over at Honestly WTF, designer Gretchen Jones shows us how to make a bold statement necklace with brass rings and neon nylon cord. (Honestly WTF)
Source4Style is launching “The Academy,” a series of 30-minute web-based seminars on sustainable design, starting with “The Apparel Industry’s Greenest Little Secrets” on February 9. (Source4Style)
A 19th century New Jersey schoolgirl’s embroidery sampler …
Atta, girl! Brooklyn’s own Carrie Parry beat 40 international contenders to receive The Green Fashion Competition’s Category 2 award, plus €15,000 in prize money, at Amsterdam Fashion Week. “It feels amazing to be honored by such a prestigious group whose goals in advancing sustainable fashion are so matched with my own,” Parry says. “Seeing my …
In an unlikely reversal of a decades-long trend, American-made goods are growing in popularity in China, according to a report by Jing Daily, a blog about the Chinese luxury market. Although they don’t have the same draw as European products, heritage workwear labels like Red Wing, Woolrich, Billy Reid, and Gitman Brothers are making inroads among China’s swelling urban middle class and their considerable disposable incomes. In December, Allen Edmonds, one of two high-end shoemakers to maintain operations Stateside, announced plans to expand into China under a new licensing deal that could double the size of its Port Washington, WI, headquarters over the next 10 years. “China is growing so fast, and it’s such a sophisticated market already,” Paul Grangaard, president and CEO of Allen Edmonds, told Milwaukee Business Times in January. “’Made in America’ has a really strong reputation there.”
KCD wants to revolutionize the runway, and you can watch it all unfold on your laptop or iPad. The public-relations powerhouse, which manages high-end labels such as Gucci, Versace, Alexander McQueen, Alexander Wang, Chanel, and Diane von Furstenberg, announced Monday that it will produce a number of fashion shows in a purely digital format. Coming on the heels of a recent show date “crisis”—a result of Milan pushing back the dates for its September shows—KCD is pitching the invitation-only Internet platform as an alternative to the increasingly crowded schedules that pull editors and store buyers in multiple, often opposing, directions. (Cue the usual gripes about aching feet.) Set to launch during New York Fashion Week, Digital Fashion Shows will debut with Prabal Gurung’s inaugural ICB collection on February 15, although his signature label will appear more conventionally on the catwalk.
As the impact of climate change becomes more difficult to ignore, advocates for a more sustainable fashion industry are finally getting the legitimacy they seek. The United Nations announced Tuesday that it was joining forces with Nordic Initiative Clean and Ethical (NICE), a joint initiative by the Nordic fashion industry to address socio-environmental issues, to develop the first sector-specific initiative under the Global Compact, which helps businesses align their operations with fundamental principles of human rights, labor, and the environment.
In a video shot secretly by human-rights activists and obtained by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Uzek service, young children are seen toiling in Uzbekistan’s cotton fields. The Uzbek government forcibly sends upwards of 2 million children—some as young as 7—to work in the fields for 10 hours a day, for two to three months each year, according to the Responsible Sourcing Network, which rallied more than 60 of the world’s leading apparel brands and retailers in October to boycott cotton knowingly harvested using child laborers in the Central Asian nation.
Photo by Olivier Saillant for Chanel
As if fashion wasn’t already synonymous with environmental excess. Karl Lagerfeld commisioned a life-size aircraft to house Chanel’s Spring/Summer 2012 couture show inside the Grand Palais in Paris on Tuesday. Subtlety has never been the designer’s strongest suit—this is the man who flew a 265-ton glacier to the City of Lights on a whim, after all—but the display of such extravagance in a depressed economy feels gauche even by the most liberal standards. Set designers didn’t just spend five days constructing the plane (or at least, the innards of one) from anodized aluminum. They also outfitted it with an extra-wide 164-foot aisle, 180-degree swivel seats for 250 high-profile guests, double-C monogrammed carpet, a holographic cockpit, and a slatted roof that revealed a vista of clouds. Mon dieu!
New Hampshire, whose state motto is “live free or die,” has a new champion in state representative Michele Peckham, who thinks that her constituents should live free of the consequences of other people’s poor decisions. The politican is the primary sponsor of House Bill 1444, a piece of legislation that would ban state employees from wearing perfume or scented products on the job, particularly if they deal with the public. “It may seem silly, but it’s a health issue,” Peckham tells the New Hampshire Union Leader. “Many people have violent reactions to strong scents.”
If former Real Housewives of New York City star Cindy Barhop didn’t think she was in enough hot water, the spa owner now compares her fox-fur bikini treatment to a cure for cancer, according to The Cut. The semi-permanent procedure, which involves affixing neon-colored fur or feathers to one’s ladyparts, are only designed to last three days—more if you avoid washing your nethers (sexy!). “It’s like buying an extra set of lingerie or a fun shirt a different pair of glasses,” Barshop, who runs Completely Bare on Madison Ave., says. “This is that fun thing that gives you a little pick-me-up.”
American retailers take note: Marks & Spencer may have joined the ranks of Patagonia and Uniqlo with its own clothing take-back program, but it isn’t doing it alone. The British department store has teamed up with Oxfam U.K. to help underprivileged communities worldwide. Simply bring any store-branded garment, shoe, or bag into an Oxfam shop for “recycling” and you’ll receive £5 off when you spend £35 or more on clothing, home, or beauty products at M&S. To help you visualize the impact of your contribution, M&S created a nifty little app that posts a piece of trivia for every article of clothing you drop onto a mannequin. Donate a blouse, for instance, and Oxfam gets £5 to buy a container for four families in Nigeria to collect water and keep it free of diseases. Drop off a purse and Oxfam has an extra £16 to protect a hectare of Colombian rainforest. (And yes, that’s Twiggy smiling at you from the top of the page.)
The carbon footprint of wool has been grossly overstated, according to a consortium of Australian woolgrowers, scientists, and carbon specialists known as the Wool Carbon Alliance. The group, which claims that recent advances in methodology have resulted in estimates up to 60 to 80 percent lower than previously indicated, wants to challenge existing notions about wool carbon using “current and relevant” science. “We are finding that the wool fiber production systems, based on renewable grass and natural vegetation, complement current demands to reduce carbon emissions,” announced Martin Oppenheimer, chairman of the alliance, on Tuesday. “Wool is part of the natural cycle of water and carbon that can impact climate in a positive way.”
Before anyone asks, no, it’s not bulletproof. But that doesn’t mean that the glistening yellow cape—the world’s largest garment made entirely from spider silk—isn’t a massive feat of engineering to be marveled (it is and you should). Now on public display for the first time at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, the textile gets its unearthly gleam from the undyed filaments of the golden orb spider, a species of arachnid commonly found in Madagascar. Girl power can be taken literally in this instance: Only the females produce the coveted silk.
Lupe Castro, one of London’s preeminent ethical-fashion stylists, has stumbled upon the quintessential dream “job.” After growing tired of limiting her travels to compartmentalized holidays, the chic jet-setter decided to extend her globe-trotting indefinitely. Accompanied by her soulmate, the mysterious “Mr. P,” a motorbike, and an infectious joie de vivre, Castro documents the road less traveled and the kindred spirits she encounters through her blog, Ms. Castro on a Motorbike.
Livia Firth isn’t content merely playing the role of eye candy on her Oscar-winning actor husband’s arm. Sweeping into the 69th Golden Globe Awards in a black-and-white Armani gown made from recycled plastic bottles, the Eco-Age creative director also kicked off the 2012 season of her self-directed “Green Carpet Challenge”—her third, for folks keeping score at home. “Being Italian, I grew up with Giorgio Armani…figuratively speaking,” she wrote in a blog post on Thursday. “Indeed, during my youth there were only two names that symbolized Italian elegance in fashion: Armani and Valentino. To open the [awards season] with a stunning bespoke eco-gown by Giorgio Armani—well, that is unreal.”
The Alexander McQueen bridal gown that Duchess Catherine wore on her wedding day has been nominated for a Design of the Year Award. (Telegraph)
After years of negotiations, Nike is finally paying factory workers in Indonesia more than $1 million in backdated overtime. (The Cut)
Skimpy underthings, fabricated events, thinly veiled threats, and a dead girl’s birth certificate—just when you thought the Victoria’s Secret West African child-labor scandal couldn’t get any weirder, now Homeland Security is leaping into the fray, according to Bloomberg News on Friday. The media outlet, which “outed” the lingerie empire in December for allegedly using underaged labor in its so-called “fair trade” line of undergarments, also refuted claims by Fairtrade International that the story was complete bunk. To thicken the plot, Fairtrade International, which oversees the fair-trade program in Burkina Faso, has also removed certain assertions about Bloomberg’s report from its website, specifically one that claimed that Cam Simpson, the reporter, asked a girl and her family to pose in a cotton field under false pretenses.
Give your fingertips a cruelty-free makeover with a set of easy-to-apply “nail skins” by Nail Couture L.A, designed exclusively for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Featuring the group’s signature bunny motif in a whimsical black-and-gray houndstooth pattern, the limited-edition wraps eschew toxic chemicals like …
If you’re thinking of adopting a more minimalist lifestyle for 2012, take a page from the playbook of Andrew Hyde, an itinerant blogger-cum-interface designer who owns only 15 items. Currently residing in New York City—he’s lived everywhere from Colorado to Rhode Island—Hyde sold most of his worldly possessions in 2010, when he set off to circumnavigate the globe by hopping from city to city. Although, to our immense relief, he doesn’t count socks or underpants, Hyde’s ability to pare down demonstrates remarkable and praiseworthy restraint. The average woman, after all, owns 20 pairs of shoes, 11 of which she never wears.
For indentured workers and human-rights advocates across the globe, January 1 was a happy new year, indeed. That’s when a groundbreaking anti-slavery retail and manufacturing law went into effect in California. Although several states already prohibit forced labor and trafficking, the new California Transparency in Supply Chains Act is the first legislation to address the supply chain on an international scale. Its gist: Any Golden State company worth at least $100 million in sales—that includes businesses like Gap and Apple—must disclose on a “conspicuous and easily understood link” on its website if it’s taking measures to eradicate slavery and human trafficking in its supply chain. For businesses that don’t have websites, the disclosures must be provided in writing within 30 days of receiving a written request.
Photos by Sheila Roth for Fox 9 News
Priscilla of Boston, best known for creating Grace Kelly’s yellow organdy bridesmaid dresses, is no more. But the 65-year-old bridal chain isn’t going out with a whimper. On Friday, eyewitnesses caught staffers spray-painting thousands of dollars’ worth of bridal and formal gowns in a dumpster outside a Priscilla of Boston boutique in Edina, MN, just shortly after the company announced it was shuttering all 19 of its locations. “I picked up a dress that was a Vera Wang, and the tag said $6,000 dollars,” Bessie Giannakakis, owner of Bessie’s Boutique, told Fox 9 News on Monday. “You wanted to throw up in the dumpster. You really did.”
