NYFW: Titania Inglis Spring/Summer 2012

Bias Tank + Half Kilt + Pleat Short / Titania Inglis S/S12

Dip-dyed Peak Dress / Titania Inglis S/S12

Colorblock U-neck Tee + Mini Pencil Skirt/Titania Inglis S/S12

Collarless Jacket + Pleat Short/Titania Inglis S/S12

Flyaway Top + Two-Tone Pant/Titania Inglis S/S12

Brooklyn based designer Titania Inglis has yet again demonstrated that sustainable fashion is all about killer style that dovetails seamlessly with the ethical use of organic and dead stock fabrics as well as local production resources such as NYC's Garment Center and the talents of natural dye expert Isa Rodrigues at the Textile Arts Center.

Titania's latest Spring/Summer 2012 collection speaks for itself in terms of bold versatility, exquisite patterns and asymmetrical draping, and the cool permutations that this graphically rich line offers. I love the addition of Bliss Lau jewelry as a means to highlight the edges and seams of the garments.

You can follow updates on Titania Inglis clothing via her blog and Facebook page.

Photography: Evan Browning
Jewelry: Bliss Lau
Model: Vanessa Lee/Muse
Makeup: Kumi Hosoda
Styling assistance: Erin Lee
Dyeing: Isa Rodrigues/Textile Arts Center

Julia Ramsey Knit Installation at the Textile Arts Center

Installation detail of Julia Ramsey's 'Engaged' knit art (photo: Joetta Maue)

Congratulations to artist/designer Julia Ramsey for the completion of her residency at the Textile Arts Center in Brooklyn. I love this image featured in Joetta Maue's Thread Reviews write up on the Textile Arts Center's blog. Perhaps Julia is suggesting that we need to become further engaged with our surroundings and environment by allowing our materials and methods to extend into uncharted, uncorseted, and organic territory? The visual and emotional effect is indeed engaging and stunning.

Read more about Julia's knitwear design work in my article on EcoSalon.

Fashioning Self and the Environment Gifts: 'Of Rags' Fair Trade Fashion

'Of Rags' fair trade fashion: recycled textile trousers 

(photo courtesy of Rachel Schwarz via Liz Ricketts)

I am pleased to share the very groovy news that Of Rags will be offering shopping coupons in the goodie totes that we will offer to the first 25 guests at 'Fashioning Self and the Environment', the art/fashion Earth Day open house at the Textile Arts Center.

"Of Rags is a fair trade fashion cooperative that combines elements of New York style and Ghanaian fashion into unique, artful clothing as a way to globalize the localized. Established in September 2009, Of Rags is the vision of J. Branson, an American social entrepreneur, photographer and musician, and RAAM, a Ghanaian designer and artist in Accra. The organizations employs seamstresses at fair trade wages and plans to work with new design partners, first in Ghana and then around the globe in a cooperative structure."

'Of Rags: Mixed Matched Dress' from textile leftovers

Guests at Friday evening's event wil alsol be able to chat with Of Rags team members, Liz Ricketts and J. Branson, at our community business table. Do not forget to rsvp to: rsvp@textileartscenter.com. See you there!

Fashioning Self and the Environment Gifts: 'A Perfume Organic' by Amanda Walker

I am very excited to announce that samples of A Perfume Organic will be included in the first 25 goodie bags that we will be giving away to guests at 'Fashioning Self and the Environment' during the Textile Arts Center Earth Day open house on Friday, April 22nd from 6pm to 9 pm.

Amanda Walker personally blends these amazing USDA certified organic scents from the purest botanicals offerings. The beautiful box packaging is also flower-seed embedded and can be planted to create your own unique 'a perfume organic' garden.

Throughout the month of April any purchase of a full-size bottle of A Perfume Organic scents will include this super-cool tote made out of 100% organic cotton. 'Stop smelling toxic, wear organic perfume' indeed. You can read a great interview with Amanda Walker on Goodlifer.

All attendees of 'Fashioning Self and the Environment' MUST rsvp in advance to: rsvp@textileartscenter.com

Fashioning Self and the Environment for Earth Day

Mosstika's installation of live succulents (Edina Tokodi/József Vályi-Tóth)

I am excited that things are coming together so organically for the Earth Day open house that I am organizing at the Textile Arts Center in Brooklyn. This evening event will take place from 6pm to 9pm on Friday, April 22, 2011, and the range of projects and activities to be shared will include a spectrum of ideas related to fashioning self, fiber, textiles, and craft in environmental outreach. Refreshments and organic treats will also be provided.

Eko-Lab's A/W 2011 Collection

The current list of artist/designer participants is as follows: 

Susan Benarcik, Meiling Chen (Fearless Dreamer), Abigail Doan, Daria Dorosh, Xing-Zhen Chung-Hilyard and Melissa Kirgan of Eko-Lab, Ceca Georgieva,Titania Inglis, Anjelika Krishna (a.d.o. clothing), Renata Mann, Rachel Miller, Eve Mosher, Shannon South (reMade USA), Study NY with Awamaki Lab, Edina Tokodi (Mosstika), Tali Weinberg, and Zoe Sheehan Saldana.

Please RSVP at rsvp@textileartscenter.com 

'Life Jackets' filled with boyant milkweed fiber 

(image courtesy of Zoe Sheehan Saldana)

NYFW: Eko-Lab AW 2011 Collection

Eko-Lab AW 2011

New York Fashion Week / Fall 2011 might officially have come to a close, but sustainable fashion in the NYC region will be continuing on a course of slow fashion goodness for the remainder of the year. My talented designer friends at Eko-Lab, Xing-Zhen Chung-Hilyard and Melissa Kirgan are just getting started on an amazing initiative for locally-inspired  production and community outreach projects aimed at connecting us with our environs.

I wanted to spotlight these beautiful images from Eko-Lab's AW 2011 collection, as they really speak to the local texture and regenerative spirit that is seeping into NYC's sustainable fashion scene. Created as a free-spirited collaboration with Emmy Award winning artist, Jennifer Wen Ma, 'The Lady on White Flees Across the Navy Yard and the Ink Follows', incorporates unique fashion artistry, 100% organic materials, and natural vegetable dyes that work so amazingly with the haunting industrial textures of Brooklyn's dockside and warehouse interiors.

Eko-Lab has currently set up residency in the Brooklyn Navy Yard as part of the Pratt Design Incubator for Sustainable Innovation program. They also participated in Re-made in America at the American Folk Art Museum in NYC on February 10, as part of the official kick-off to New York Fashion Week. Their recently re-designed website will soon feature an online shop as well as a blog that will highlight events and textile outreach efforts. Stay tuned for more information regarding their project for 'Fashioning Self and the Environment' at the Textile Arts Center in Brooklyn for Earth Day 2011.

To learn more visit Eko-Lab / images courtesy of the designers

Photographer: Kristin Kirgan 

Assistant: Joerg Kuehnelt 

Models: Katie LaFleur / Danita Chantel 

Makeup artist: Jennifer Nam 

Hair artist: Kanako Ito 

Adie + George at NOW Showcase This Weekend

Such exciting news that Adie + George will be showing their AW2011 Collection at the NOW Showcase in NYC this weekend. My fashion reporting colleagues at EcoSalon, Amy DuFault and Gretchen Jones, will be there for the full scoop. Stay tuned for more photos from Adie + George's AW2011 Lookbook. Sasha Duerr of the Permacouture Institute and Casey Larkin of Mr. Larkin have yet again created the most stunningly pure sustainable fashion endeavor.

On Sunday, February 20, Sasha will also be on hand to chat about and sign copies of her amazing new book, The Handbook Of Natural Plant Dyes, at the Textile Arts Center in Brooklyn. This event is free to the public and is sure to be an inspiring take on slow fashion goodness.

Sasha Duerr Book Event

SUNDAY, February 20 from  5 to 7PM

Cocktails, book signing, Q+A, demos

rsvp@textileartscenter.com

Adie + George photography by Chloe Aftel

Styling/Hair + Make-up by Shawn Burke

Save the Date: Fashioning Self and the Environment, An Earth Day Event at Brooklyn's Textile Arts Center

Titania Inglis Spring/Summer 2011 Collection

Save the Date for  this Earth Day event at the Textile Arts Center

in Brooklyn on Friday, April 22, 2011 

Join me for Earth Day 2011 to explore ideas related to fashioning self and our shared environment. Invited artists and local sustainable fashion designers will feature their own fiber, textile, and green design initiatives, as well as offering activities related to slow fashion styling and organic interactions with the environment.

Visitors will be able chat first hand with presenters, participate in on-site activities, and celebrate Earth Day 2011 with refreshments and treats from local sponsors and green businesses.

Susan Benarcik, Meiling Chen of Fearless Dreamer, Abigail Doan, Daria Dorosh, Eko-Lab, Titania Inglis, Eve Mosher, and Zoe Sheehan Saldana – are just a few of the names who will be participating.

Organically Grown sculpture by Susan Benarcik

Friday, April 22, 2011 from 6-9PM

rsvp@textileartscenter.com

Blogger Style Now: Isa Rodrigues

Some of my favorite bloggers of the moment work quietly behind the scenes, fine-tuning their craft and writing without all of the hoopla of twitter and social media. Isa Rodrigues blogs and tells stories about textiles and fiber the same way that she might weave a new sample of cloth or pick wildflowers for a vat of natural dye in a community-based workshop.

Isa is a textiles conservator, master natural dye-er, and a regular blogger for Brooklyn's Textile Arts Center blog. She also is the resident studio manager at TAC, and if you are ever lucky enough to visit or take a class there, you might see her working out a new weaving problem like the delicate one pictured below.

I love how Isa's writing speaks to her love for textiles and a wealth of information that she has amassed here in the US and abroad. She is also refreshingly humble, though with a dry sense of (Portuguese?) humor that I am probably just catching on to.

You can follow Isa and her knowledgeable colleagues, specifically the industrious Owyn Ruck, on TAC's blog daily. If ever there was a way to wake up and feel good about life, it is with a bit of warp and weft input from the people who know their craft.

Follow Isa and her colleagues on the Textile Art Center's blog here.

*images courtesy of Brooklyn Skillshare, TAC & Isa Rodrigues

Natural Dyes in Fashion: We Have Come A Long Way Baby

Tinctory's Fall Necklace / silk naturally dyed with fallen autumn leaves

It is ironic that during my childhood I used to turn a bit red in the face when my mother had huge vats of natural dyes brewing in the kitchen. What was I to say to friends who were visiting for a playdate while my mother practiced her alchemy and what appeared to be witchcraft on our country kitchen stove?

Canadian textile artist Mackenzie Frere's plant-dyed yarns for weaving

'Cochineal Plantation' illustration via Philosophy of Science Portal

My mother was also occasionally receiving little packets of cochineal bugs via rural post, and we often stopped the car on the way home from the grocery store to pick seemingly useless roadside weeds. Yes, the thought did cross my mind, “Why couldn’t my mother just be normal and bake layer cakes and shop at the mall.”

Bodkin's A/W09 cotton/jersey dress hand-dyed with the above cornucopia of plant-based dyes

Contemporary eco fashion is definitely celebrating an upswing of interest in natural dyes and plant-based (kitchen) alchemy. Little did I know that several decades ago, my crafty mother was on to something rather timeless and chic. The ancients, of course, utilized natural dyes as an expression of status and luxury, but modern life is indisputably linked to working outside of the home and commuting great distances, not steeping garments in one's own garden clippings and brews. Stop. Think again. We are on a fast-track to slow design goodness these days.

India Flint 'eco-dye' textiles (image via Sparrow Salvage)

There has been a lot of great press recently featuring natural dyes in fashion, interior design, and the delectable crossover with the slow food movement. Sasha Duerr Fossel of The Permacouture Institute has artfully led us down this weedy and seedy path, while India Flint has been an 'eco dye' advocate before it became tried in hue, so to speak. 

Jai's S/S 2011 plant and kitchen-based natural dye R-T-W designs (photo: Lou Rouse/via Treehugger)

It is no coincidence, perhaps, that at a time when we keep inching our design expectations for sustainable fashion forward, we are also genuinely hungry for those things that anchor us to the domestically familiar and the sensory-imbued.

'Harvest Dye Workshop' at the Textile Arts Center in Brooklyn

We have come a long way, Mom, 'Baby', as lovers of process and those memories that bring us gently home again, even if we are far, far away from the proverbial Kansas.