EcoPlum Green Living Blog
Patagonia’s Drive Toward Sustainability
by Ciarra Wentzel, March 20 2017, 29 Comments
Worn Wear Wagon from erinfeinblatt.wordpress.com. Can you remember your first day of school, going on your first date, or getting a big promotion at work? Can you remember what you were wearing? I bet your old, beat-up jacket, worn-out jeans,...
Lab-Grown Fabric is the New Faux-Fur and Pleather
by Ciarra Wentzel, January 11 2017, 72 Comments
Photo: Modern Meadow's Lab-Grown Leather Winter is here and fashionistas all over New York City are eager to wear those new 100% rabbit fur jackets with matching snakeskin booties down city streets. Little do these fashion gurus know that their...
Book Review: Michael Lavergne, Fixing Fashion
by Michelle Blanco, November 27 2016, 126 Comments
A Broken System Most conscious consumers would agree; fashion needs to be fixed. Over the past 600 years, progress has been made in outlawing the unsavory mechanisms propelling this industry forward. While slavery and child labor have been abolished, new...
SOURCE Denim: The New Leading Company in Ethical & Sustainable Fashion That You Need to Know
by Ciarra Wentzel, November 15 2016, 37 Comments
Leaves are falling, clocks were dialed an hour back, and the temperature is dropping—which means it is time to put away the jean shorts and cover up those legs with a new collection of denim pants. We all know that...
Ecological Crisis in Brazil is No Match for Competing Countries
by Ciarra Wentzel, August 18 2016, 0 Comments
Photo courtesy of CBC News (Canada) The 2016 games are on! On August 5th, Rio welcomed the Olympic games in Brazil during the opening ceremony. As impressive as the ceremony might have been, there has been some obvious controversy regarding...
Fashion and Globalization: The Girls All Look the Same
by Michelle Blanco, July 07 2016, 2 Comments
As a teenager, I spent the summers in Spain. I remember being just as excited to eat paella and see distant cousins as I was to discover the latest trends. In 1998, blogs didn’t exist and the fashion industry still...
An American's Guide to Thrift Shopping in Paris
by Ciarra Wentzel, June 29 2016, 0 Comments
Ah Paris, the city of romance, fashion, and trendy cuisines, what would we do without you? As a little girl, I dreamt about visiting what many fashionistas envision as the chicest city in the world. And for many, it has...
Calvin Klein Takes on the Green Carpet Challenge at this Year’s Met Gala
by Ciarra Wentzel, May 18 2016, 0 Comments
Emma Watson (Left), Margot Robbie (Middle) and Lupita Nyong’o (Right) at the 2016 Met Gala. Photo from telegraph.co.uk Luxury fashion designer Calvin Klein is progressively jumping on the sustainable fashion bandwagon. At this month's Met Gala, hosted by Idris Elba,...
Who Made My Clothes: A Fashion Revolution
by Ciarra Wentzel, April 20 2016, 3 Comments
Photo taken from fashionrevolution.org Fashion Revolution, a non-profit organization based in the UK, asks this simple, yet hard-to-answer question, “Who made your clothes?” The organization was established after the 2013 tragedy in Dhaka, Bangladesh when a building that housed clothing...
Gardening in Fashion
by Ciarra Wentzel, March 09 2016, 0 Comments
Photo by Brenna Dolan Let’s get the facts straight about the real costs of what’s in your closet. The Big Issue Every year, just one single person throws away 68 pounds of clothing and textiles; that is 4% of total...
The Hidden Price of Fast Fashion - "The True Cost" Documentary Film Review
by Sasha Cohen, June 24 2015, 0 Comments
“This enormous, rapacious industry that is generating so much profit; why is it that it is unable to support millions of its workers properly? The business model is completely unsustainable.” -British journalist Lucy Siegle in The True Cost The True...
From Seed to Jewelry
by Sasha Cohen, February 03 2015, 0 Comments
Encanto Jewels, Powered by Tagua Thanks to a gift from her mother, Monica Farbiarz, owner and designer of Encanto, discovered tagua (pronounced tag-wah). On a trip to Colombia, her home country, Monica's mother gifted her a tagua necklace. Tagua's natural...
Decentralizing Fashion Sustainability
by Sasha Cohen, December 10 2014, 1 Comment
Integrating Sustainability Patagonia has adopted a new decentralized approach to sustainability which eliminates the separate sustainability group and incorporates sustainability-concentrated positions in their related departments of the company (e.g. those with environmental materials expertise were moved into the materials department;...
Susty Fashion: Repurposing for the Planet - Fashion Upcycling
by Sasha Cohen, November 05 2014, 0 Comments
Did you ever think that when you wear your grandma’s beautifully tailored jacket or purchase from a trendy vintage shop, a Salvation Army or a military surplus store, that you are helping to solve an environmental problem? You’re even helping...
Artisan Scarves Empower Bangladeshi Women
by Sasha Cohen, September 10 2014, 2 Comments
When a thing of beauty furthers humanitarian goals and creates better, healthier lives, it gives me pause. I feel compelled to learn more about the company and its founder. sourceFK manufactures beautiful silk scarves and other textile products, celebrating and...
Dry Cleaning: Eco Options
by Guest Blogger, December 30 2008, 0 Comments
Copyright: andreypopov / 123RF Stock Photo Regardless of the name, dry cleaning is not a dry process. In traditional methods, potent chemical solvents are used to remove stains from delicate fabrics, and these solvents can be toxic to your health...