Eco Fashion World

If you are looking for inspiration this spring, then look no further than a new poetry book that is penned by the man who set up fashion label Komodo, the Nepalese natural clothing line. Mark Bloom, aka Joe Komodo, offers an insight into his twenty-year expedition through the world of fashion, politics and ardour with this collection of stimulating poetry.

‘Joe Komodo’ explains the reason behind the book: ‘I wrote little poems as a kid in a few summer holiday camps. Then I forgot about it. Then when Komodo was a couple of years old I started to feel pressure from press people to explain who our ‘designer’ was and what Komodo stood for. The truth was that we were just a gang of mates having a laugh and it was all a bit messy, so I invented Joe Komodo. And then as the other brands all had hang tags that said stuff like, ‘We are the world’s greatest brand for 100 years’ and other such goop, I thought I’d spin a few rhymes and shoot from the hip!’

For Bloom it’s been all about the journey and one that will continue. ‘Komodo has been a great trip. After a few years as a traveller I looked for a way to forge a closer relationship with the local people and business and fashion is a vehicle for that. To create and produce sustainably a style of fashion demands a huge number of people to work in some kind of harmony together across the globe. It’s a big circus trick to pull off! Juggling is just the start of it. So, whilst I never had any fashion education I was a good traveller and that I feel was just as valuable in managing a business like Komodo. ‘

True to the honest values of Komodo and produced in Katmandu, the words are presented in raw hand screen-printed earthiness on Himalayan lokta (rice) paper. With Toby Leigh’s lively illustrations and Bloom’s musings on globalisation and the millennium bug to the death of Princess Diana, this truly is a book of our time.

Joe Komodo’s Famous Last Words is available from Komodo, 50 Earlham Street, Covent Garden London and at www.komodo.co.uk. All profits from the book sales go to the Tibet relief fund.

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