Eco Fashion World

'When a butterfly claps its wings…..'

'The energy here is different from regular fashion fairs, I can't express it in words, it's really a feeling'. This is just a phrase by the founder of an eco fashion brand I spoke with at Ethical Fashion Show in October last year.

This week, the Stoere Vrouwen were promoting the delights of an eco lifestyle. By presenting products like tea, chocolate, wine and books they inspired a lot of Dutch women at the Housekeeping Fair. This event is one of the biggest events in the Netherlands and attracts 250.000 women every year.

'Little Princess Nothing-Is-Enough'

A long time ago, my dad gave me this little bird. It's a proud little bird that symbolizes how he sees me: serious inside but with an obvious dash of frivolity. Eco fashion is my passion exactly because of that. It's about how you look but with a message behind it. Fashion on its own always seemed too superficial to me. But eco fashion combines my intrinsic motivators in life: the ideals of fighting for social and environmental issues packaged in aesthetics.

'Life itself is my school'

One of my earlier childhood memories is the image of my mum bent over a sewing machine. While my dad was getting another degree, she was home alone at night with us kids. We used to play together as she sewed our clothes. I loved my white dress with the pink apron, but I hated the blue skirt she made for me. That must have hurt her after all the hours of patiently creating these clothes.

Along with Tine Luyt, the initiator of the website Modebewust, I gave a lecture about Sustainable Design for international students from the prestigious Dutch Design Academy in Eindhoven yesterday. We were very pleased to be invited to this inspiring industrial building that used to be the Philips Light Factory. Tine and I talked about some developments in sustainable design and we gave the students some tips and examples. The aim was to see some innovative eco designs of these great students in the near future.

'This village, this is my world'

My grandmother always had a weak health but a strong character. She was born in the 1920's during the first wave of female liberation. My grandparents only had three kids, a disgrace in the catholic village where they lived. My mum recalls that the priest came visiting them to ask what was wrong. Nothing was wrong, my grandmother just had other priorities. Like opening her own fashion store. After years of being at home with the kids, she transformed my granddad's business into a lingerie shop. Women from all over the region came to her for their corsets and suspenders. I imagine that while their kids played with my mum and uncles, these ladies giggled as they were trying on the sexy tents my grandmum offered.

My mum gave me this beautiful quilt for my birthday. It's made of hundreds of pieces of fabric in my favorite colors. Bit by bit sewn together in blocks with a red square at the heart of every block. Hours of labor and love she put into this quilt. My mum knows what her daughter needs in Swiss winters, being far away from home.

Today was a HUGE day for Green with Fashion! Maybe it had something to do with the beautiful weather we are experiencing in Philadelphia today, or maybe it's just pure luck. Either way, our list of contributing designers skyrocketed from 19 to 24 in literally the span of an hour. I was just hoping that we would break 20 for the event... after all "20 designers" sounds so much prettier than "19 designers" -- but "24 locally- and nationally-known designers" sure sounds amazing as well!