Features
Web watch - Sustainable style
If it's not too personal a question, what are you wearing? I ask only to see if you know. For most, the answer is probably a fine array of fungicide and fertiliser aided cotton, a nice cosy pesticide-dipped wool, and a few pints of our less-than-abundant oil supply.
It's not long since a sustainable wardrobe meant wearing your old shirts for farm work and, short of cutting a few holes in a grain sack, there was little one could do about it. A few innovators may have tried harder, but if the BBC's The Good Life taught us anything, it's that weaving your own suit and dyeing it with nettles makes you look silly at best. So short of a few specialist clothes shops, it was chemical costumery all round.
Luckily, this is no longer the case. It's getting increasingly easy to ensure that the new outfit you're buying doesn't rely on poisoning rivers and degrading soil. Organic clothes can now be bought in mainstream high-street chains, as the industry begins to realise the error of its ways (not tapping that lucrative 'environmentalism' market sooner, I suppose).
Consumers are increasingly savvy when it comes to the environmental and ethical impact of their purchases. But, how does one keep track of sartorial ethical standards? Why, we turn to the web of course, where someone else will do it for us.
Ethical dressing
If you want to know how conventionally produced materials are processed, as well as the organic alternative, then visit www.organicclothing.blogs.com. Here you'll find a series of 'Facts behind the Fibres' articles detailing the processes of clothing manufacturing and their environmental effect. While the information is often preceded by a few paragraphs of marketing gibberish (for example, "wool is composed of the same protein that makes up the outer protective layer of your skin and works in total harmony with your body's own protection mechanisms" is just woolly thinking), it is worth wading past this to the detailed information on the chemicals used in clothing production to know the full effects of our frippery.
For those who still think organic clothing means scratchy burlap, take a look at www.wearingthefuture.com, a site dedicated to both style and sustainability. Wearing the Future is a resource for those who are trying to balance their fondness for fashion with sustainability concerns, and promises to provide information without "fluffy, PR-soaked, greenwashing nonsense." While you're unlikely to find a detailed discussion of the effects of atrazine, there is a lot of information here for the everyday consumer, written in an accessible, magazine style that is designed to attract as wide an interest as possible.
Green design
Having ransacked your wardrobe, let's move on to the rest of your worldly goods. It is not just in clothing manufacture that interest in sustainability as well as saleability is on the rise. From furniture to transportation, environmental impact and energy use are being taken into account from the earliest design stages in an increasing number of products.
One place to track the technological and design innovations that are working toward a sustainable future is www.inhabitat.com In their mission statement, the authors of Inhabitat.com express their frustration with the emerging idea of 'green design', "as if sustainability is somehow seperate [sic] from good design in general." It is with the principle that "good design is green design" that this site sets about showcasing 'green' design innovations as designs that can improve the world we inhabit, rather than a novel, 'environmentalist' niche.
From handbags made from recycled plastics, to the self sufficient ZeroHouse, which collects its own water, creates its own power and processes its own waste, Inhabitat.com presents a huge array of green designs for every aspect of our lives. With designs divided into broad categories like architecture, interiors, transportation etc., even a quick browse through Inhabitat.com turns up some impressive concepts.
An MIT research team has invented a computer microchip, for example, which will run entirely on body heat. This rather neat attempt to reduce the power consumption of our energy-hungry technologies could be applied to our mobile phones or pacemakers and remove the need for a battery. And in case you're not impressed, the related items at the bottom of the page link to a number of other potential uses for our body heat alone.
Here to stay
However, Inhabitat.com doesn't just feature proof-of-concept designs that have yet to, and perhaps may never, see the light of day. Many practically applicable designs are featured on the site, as well as individual examples of resourceful re-use of materials. The recycled textile chair, which is made from waste cuttings from the pleated fabric industry, is one such application of materials that would otherwise be wasted. On the other hand, I will leave aesthetic judgement of the armchair made from an old shopping trolley to the reader. Suffice to say, I haven't sat in a trolley since my toddler years, and I'm not sure I'm willing to revert to said activity.
The rising trend for ecologically sound design, from clothing to furniture, housing to electronics, is definitely an encouraging one. It is becoming increasingly integrated into mainstream consumer goods, making it available to more and more people. Some of this may be affected by commercial interests chasing the trends, but whether from cynicism or genuine concern, no retailer or manufacturer can ignore it. Sustainability is no longer a niche demographic, or another facet of our 'consumer choice', but is seen as an integral and necessary part of all our manufacturing and design by an increasing number of manufacturers, designers and consumers.
I'd bless their cotton socks if they could vouch for their provenance.
