Children’s early years have been in the news recently, thanks to the Princess of Wales’s launching of a campaign emphasising the long-term benefits of investing in the first five years of a child’s life. In a report for her Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood, she warned how the roots of adult problems, such as mental health issues and addictions, often trace back to those years. We at Fashion Roundtable, and the Fashion Roundtable Education Committee, suggest that we should be looking beyond those first five years, too. A poignant OP:ED by Fiona McKenzie Johnston.
Last week Traid and Hemingway Design launched Charity Super.Mkt, bringing together for the first time, Britain's charity retailers and creating a physical department store in former Topshop space. We hear from CEO of Traid Maria Chenoweth on the new concept.
In honour of the late Dame Vivienne Westwood, The Vivienne Foundation launched last week. Since the start of her career in the 1970's, Vivienne has been renowned not only for her eponymous label, but also in utilising her platform for activism. The Vivienne Foundation exists to honour, protect and continue the legacy of Vivienne's creativity and activism.
Activist Group ‘Pregnant Then Screwed’ made deadlines over social media this week, as the Education Select Committee has launched an inquiry into childcare and early years education. Given so many of the fashion industry are women, as well as freelance, to delve further into the issue of access to good quality, affordable and accessible childcare, and the impact this might have on your career, decisions to have children, and your hopes for your family, we interviewed Employment Law Specialist Sarah Russell. In this Q&A she answers our questions on paternity leave, freelancing and childcare, and discrimination, with a fashion industry focus.
Fashion Roundtable’s Slow-fashion Policy lead and writer, Meg Pirie, talks with a local guild who are at closure, with the Welsh Wool Museum and the Heritage Craft Association on why skills are more important than ever. With comments from the Welsh Government on introducing the ARTS back into their curriculum.
Fashion Roundtable’s Slow-fashion Policy Expert for Wales and Writer, Meg Pirie, shares an in-depth piece featuring iconoclastic stakeholders in the woollen industry. With insight from Deborah Barker, Fibreshed; Maria Benjamin and Zoe Fletcher, The Wool Library; as well as comments from Andrew Hogley, CEO of British Wool.
Writer, Meg Pirie, in conversation with Kate Fletcher and Mathilda Tham about Welsh wool, the climate crisis and the importance of localism for the next generation.
In a world which feels uncertain, unstable, and all too frequently it is, there is something very powerful in recognising the timelessness of sustainable values, craft skills, nature and provenance. These are core to our work at Fashion Roundtable and what I found refreshing was to see them in action from education through to business via the work of The Princes Foundation.
I am often asked where the idea for a soil to skin, vertically integrated yarn and knitwear brand came from - and perhaps HERD would never have come into being without these unconventional roots - but it actually came from seaweed of all things, in my prior brand where we sourced wild, naturally occurring seaweed directly from harvesters around the U.K, Ireland and Northern Europe.
The VAT RES allowed the UK to be the number one European destination for global tourists looking to purchase fashion items and reclaim their tax. This was stopped when the UK left the EU and currently Paris, not London is their tax-free tourist destination of choice.
Micro influencers are all too often happy to get paid in free clothes, which cost pennies to make, and their recommendations often come across as more authentic to their followers, because they are less obviously advertising and are more engaged with their audiences to boost their follower numbers.
Unfortunately it seems Iran is not ‘on brand’. Iranian women are seen only through the lens of an oppressed regime and have a history of negative portrayal by the western media. As many have always suspected, the message of diversity we have seen the fashion industry peddling in recent years is often little not more than virtue signalling in a world where Iranian women don’t matter. To be fair, this isn’t unique to the fashion industry - Iranian women have been invisible under a cloaked veil for over forty years. But that’s why it is so important that the fashion industry looks beyond the stereotype of Iranian women.
Salts Mill hosted the Campaign for Wool's launch event leading to the current Wool Week last Thursday night. The Heritage site in Bradford (the cultural capital of the worlds's wool industry) is to the keratin fibre what Bournville is to Chocolate.
The government should focus on increasing productivity and investment in skills. The UK has a lower productivity level and growth than other countries such as Germany, France, and the US. A longer-term plan focused on investment in skills and innovation will amount to a more sustainable economic growth compared to short-term policy options such as the tax cuts proposed.
I attended the London Fashion Week show where the Queen came to present the Queen Elizabeth II Award for British Design to Richard Quinn. The energy in the room was effervescent, a jaded fashion audience giddy with excitement at meeting their queen, who was by far the chicest there, in her Angela Kelly designed powder blue suit. It was a joyous occasion. A real celebration of UK talent and skills.
“We are over producing and over wasting at the same time. We really need to readdress this and almost have to go back to basics to understand the new vision because if you just can do a bit of this and that but the whole industry needs to change.”
This week Fashion Roundtable’s Meg Pirie interviewed four graduates ahead of Loomshed’s Textile Graduate Talk Day. The interview covers traditional folk art, sustainable dyes, hand weaving and the use of surplus British wool from mills.
With more and more crafts being added to the Endangered Crafts List, this is an important conversation in preserving skills as well as our heritage here in the UK. These graduates were particularly focused on localism and small-scale production and it was particularly refreshing to discuss textiles from an earth-first perspective and away from the tired growth model.
Amelia Twine, founded Sustainable Fashion Week in the UK and also chairs Fashion Roundtable's Sustainability and Justice Committee. Here she shares more about the issues with the fast-fashion model and the traction that the partnership between Shein and the Or Foundation received last week, as well as the waste and human rights issues prevalent in the sector. Amelia calls on policy decisions that level the playing field to prompt the action required for accountability needed now.
