Coco Eco Magazine

Freeing Eco Couture From The Seams That Bind!

Through his ecofashion creations, Johnson Hartig has single-handedly revolutionized the way we look at used clothing. Hartig integrates graphic design, clothing deconstruction and additional enhancements into each piece creating a new, completely distinct look called a one-off, meaning one of a kind. Hartig finds a vintage piece, reassembles it, exposes the stitching and raw edges, augments it with details and graphics and voila, a Libertine piece of art is born. Every Libertine fashion piece on the market is one hundred percent original and one hundred percent recycled.

“I think the thing that initially appealed to me was I loved the idea of putting something on that was already worn in,” Johnson said. “It was very appealing to me to pick up something secondhand, very inexpensive and not have the burden of something new that you have to take care of, watch over or be very careful with. I just like the idea of looking like you don’t care too much. Additionally for me, it’s really exciting to take something that’s been discarded and turn it back into something valuable again.”

Freeing Eco Couture From The Seams That Bind!

Aside from the obvious environmental benefits of recycling clothing, Hartig’s whole graphic silk screening process is also lean and green. For Libertine’s silk screenings, each piece is done individually.

“We do it all on an ironing board here in the studio, using nontoxic inks. We keep it as ecologically minded as possible,” Hartig said.

Hartig and former design partner Cindy Greene launched Libertine in the fall of 2001. With its urbane, topsy-turvy style, Libertine not only remained distinct from other labels, it raised the bar on vintage chic.  Just how much did Libertine raise the bar?  One of the most iconic designers of the 20th century, Karl Lagerfeld was enthralled with Libertine.

Freeing Eco Couture From The Seams That Bind!

“Karl Lagerfeld would come to the studio in New York and just basically buy out the studio,” Hartig said. “Its’ been exciting that way.”

Lagerfeld isn’t the only celebrity coveting Hartig’s masterpieces. “Celebrities in Libertine” sightings include Brad Pitt, Gwyneth Paltrow, Mick Jagger, Michael Stipe, Damien Hirst, Liv Tyler and Orland Bloom.

“I had a Christmas party this year and Orlando Bloom was there,” Hartig said, “Orlando came up to me and said ‘I’ve been such a fan of yours from the beginning.”

Hartig believes it’s the inimitable quality of every Libertine piece that makes it so alluring for those that could have any designer they wanted.

“I think what appeals to so many rock stars and celebrities is that you never see your garment on anyone else,” Johnson said.  “And for anyone that wants to look very individualistic, that’s very attractive.”

Freeing Eco Couture From The Seams That Bind!

So how did Hartig, a man that’s never studied fashion design and really wasn’t all that obsessed with fashion become an eco-couture thought provoker?
A return to Hartig’s childhood provides some answers.

“I was raised during punk and new wave in the eighties. It was a period when fashion was creative and exciting. As a kid at home, I can remember rearranging the furniture, hanging pictures, putting out flowers and styling my Mom. I learned, by watching serious fashion, what designer clothes looked like. My favorite was “Style with Elsa Clinch” and that really influenced me. I think that was probably the impetus for my becoming a fashion improver,” Hartig said. “Then my grandmother taught me how to sew a straight stitch on an old Singer sewing machine when I was 16 years old.”

Although Hartig had been wearing vintage clothes since his early teens, learning to sew opened him up to a whole new world.  “I would search for interesting vintage clothes and augment them and that’s how the whole thing began,” Hartig explained. “Because it’s what I wanted to wear myself. I first chose and recreated things that I would wear.”

Freeing Eco Couture From The Seams That Bind!

Former designing partner Cindy Greene had been a vintage clothes fan along with Hartig since they were kids and helped create their first collection. The story behind this first collection is a designer’s dream come true.

“Over the course of one weekend in New York City in 2001, Cindy and I bought and remade 15 men’s shirts. We put graphics on them, which was revolutionary at the time, because no one had put graphics on button downs,” Hartig said. “I brought the 15 shirts back to LA for delivery to the Ron Herman store. They called back a couple of days later. They said that people were grabbing them out of their hands while they were hanging them up and they’d sold out in 45 minutes and needed 25 more right away. That’s really how it all began.”

Greene decided last year that she wanted to branch out into other areas while Johnson has remained firmly entrenched in Libertine. Hartig now runs the show solo.

Freeing Eco Couture From The Seams That Bind!

Hartig’s styles intersperse classically traditional designs with flourishes of utter disregard for convention. His frayed seams, raw stitches and unconventional pleats have become Libertine signatures as much as the novel graphics. The graphic themes of past collections have included Abraham Lincoln, early American folk art, goth, 19th century Victorian, and punk.

Hartig’s spring collection “Orbs and Philosophers” was the result of a stay at a haunted hotel in Death Valley with Kate and Laura Mulleavy of Rodarte. While taking pictures inside the hotel, Hartig noticed orbs in nearly all the images he shot. Whether it was paranormal energy or bad lighting, the orb phenomena served as the inspiration for this delightful and lighthearted collection.

Hartig’s newest line for men and women features rows of giant dots on tailored tuxedo shirts, on lightweight boldly colored sleeveless shifts over black tights, as well as on sweet classic black and white strapless sheaths, all paired with feathered circular hats and bracelets. A business look for Libertine Spring 2010 features a gray women’s jacket and skirt with the giant dots over a black sequined diamond patterned blouse.

Freeing Eco Couture From The Seams That Bind!

As for the ecofashion future of Libertine, Hartig is excited.

“I feel really fortunate because now I’m in a position to do really, anything I want and there are so many things I want to do. My goal is to just keep it fun. We’re always going to be a very specialized little niche company. I don’t have corporate aspirations for it. Just keeping the customer interested, keep myself and my crew excited about it,” Hartig said. “It’s a nice way to make a living, you know, to be able do what we want and be conscientious about the environment while creating something that is exciting and good to the earth.”

For more Libertine, go to: www.ilovelibertine.com.

Freeing Eco Couture From The Seams That Bind!

50 Trees Leaf

Love Heals is one of those companies that you just want to succeed. Perhaps its because every single piece of Love Heals jewelry purchased protects a child from blindness for one year; saves another child from slavery for one month and plants 10 trees. In terms of doing good while doing business, it doesn’t get much better than Love Heals. 

Case in point, with the 2009 holiday season, Love Heals has stepped up their amazing concept. Their holiday collection, Love Does Heal features three themes of jewelry set up as series, the 50 Trees series, the Vision series and the Freedom series. With the purchase of one piece of jewelry from the 50 Trees series, Love Heals plants 50 fruit trees in Ethiopia through Greener Ethiopia. A holiday jewelry purchase from the Vision series keeps five children from blindness for life through Vitamin Angels. For every piece of jewelry sold from the Freedom series, a child is rescued from slavery through Abolish Slavery. Love Heals jewelry is truly a gift that just keeps on giving.

50 Trees Sturdy

Love Heals jewelry is the brainchild of founder Adriana Goddard and her son Gunnar Lovelace. These original works of jeweled art are designed and crafted by hand in a geodesic studio dome on the family’s organic farm in Southern California.

A communal environment that is, at its core, sustainable and organic, Love Heals actually began as a company in 2005 when Goddard’s son, Gunnar Lovelace partnered with his mother. Adriana had always designed jewelry and while helping sell her jewelry at a flea market on Mother’s Day in 2004, Lovelace saw the emotional reaction that women had to Adriana’s jewelry and how powerfully it touched their lives. For over two decades, Lovelace was a successful business developer, designed jewelry and  wrote highly acclaimed software programs including one designed to teach children to read.

Adriana

As Love Heals president, Lovelace focuses on developing collaborations with social causes that best represent their mission for Love Heals. Lovelace coordinates their environmental tree-planting partnerships as well as those with the child anti-slavery and child anti-blindness organizations that are such a major component  of the Love Heals business model. Adriana’s daughter Elisa Perez also works and lives the Love Heals lifestyle as vice president of sales.

Although it may seem as if her jewelry business just took off in 2005, the fact is Goddard has been working towards this all of her life. Growing up in Buenos Aires, Goddard’s parents were avid 18th century antique collectors. Goddard fled Argentina’s harsh military dictatorship as a young woman and settled in London where she began making and selling jewelry for a living. Goddard was able to transfer her jewelry making talents to many different continents during years of travel and living abroad, settling for a time on the Spanish island of Ibiza where Gunnar was born. After several years there, Goddard packed it up and crossed the ocean to California, eventually landing in Ojai where Love Heals is headquartered. 

Freedom Deliverance

In understanding Goddard’s background, one begins to grasp where the inspiration for the unique look of Love Heals originates. During her travels, Goddard collects impressions and interesting pieces to integrate into her designs. Created exclusively using ethically sourced materials, every piece of Love Heals jewelry is embellished with good intentions as well as charms discovered in flea markets and antique shops in all corners of the world.

One of Goddard’s travel stories gives an idea of the experiences that contribute to the original design of each piece of Love Heals’ jewelry. According to Goddard, “I was hanging out in Chiang Mai in Thailand and befriended an American who traded in sacred Buddhist artifacts,” Goddard said. “Early one morning, he took me to a swap meet in which traders from Laos, Cambodia, Burma and Thailand were doing their thing. We were the only foreigners. It was a total thrill.”

Freedom Wings

Love Heals jewelry is anything but traditional yet it has classic primordial undertones that speak to different types of people in their own inner language. Goddard describes the Love Heals jewelry line this way, “We have a vast product range which goes from delicate, devotional pieces to powerful talismanic statements, sweeping by sophisticated concepts to romantic bridal elements.”

Goddard sees the woman who wears Love Heals as having an active and spiritual life while surrounding herself with meaningful, personal objects.

“My jewelry is born of a deep human familiarity with all of the beautiful quirks and aspirations humans hold,” Goddard said.

Goddard’s favorite thing about Love Heals is…all of it. From the jewelry design to the charitable works, all of it serves to put Goddard in a special place in her life, as is obvious in her joyful description of her “favorite things about her work.”

LH Jewelry

“My heart sings when I am designing, carving waxes, finding artists to cooperate with, sourcing materials and delving into the history of jewelry and art,” Goddard said.

For those who want to emulate Goddard by following their dreams into design, Goddard offers these jewels of wisdom, “… for any designer, view curiosity as one of your main allies. Be curious about yourselves, the world around you, the history of jewelry…Be faithful to your own interests,” Goddard said. “Find causes you would like to be affiliated with and support them.”

Goddard, optimistically yet realistically envisions industry wide changes across the board towards sustainability in jewelry design, fashion and lifestyle, “I would like to see much, much more recycled material and really responsible sourcing of all the materials,” Goddard said. “I think the public should ask for carefully sourced materials. That the gemstones are mined and handled in a conscious way.”

Vision Lotus

As for future plans at Love Heals, Goddard’s focus is clear, “To do more work directly involved with the different causes we love to support and to make that the gist of our business,” Goddard said. 

Based on the level of support that Love Heals already commits to, that statement is quite telling. Consider the success of Love Heals’ charitable work within their business model. In their first year, Love Heals planted over 250,000 trees in Africa and the United States. Currently the total number of trees planted is 320,000.  

So when you buy a piece of jewelry from Love Heals, your dollars go to work to help others. Hence their tag line for their new collection, Love Does Heal.

Momand Son

In southern California, Love Heals can be found in luxury retail locations like Fred Segal, Calypso, and Planet Blue.

For more information on Love Heals jewelry as well as their work with charitable organizations, go to,www.loveheals.com,  www.abolishslavery.org/video, www.vitaminangels.org and  www.greenerethiopia.org.

Elena Garcia: Simply Sustainable, Socially Just and Totally Beautiful
Images by Nick Fallon

In a world of fashion choices, Elena Garcia goes beyond clothes into a lifestyle choice.

Elena Garcia: Simply Sustainable, Socially Just and Totally Beautiful
by Vicki Godal
Images by Nick Fallon

Seeing the plight of the underserved first hand in her job as a linguist changed eco fashion designer Elena Garcia’s life. Garcia’s work took her into the world of minority communities and penitentiary institutions. These experiences drove her to get her degree in Surface Textiles at the London College of Fashion. Right off the bat, Garcia collaborated with Ilya Fisher to create their first eco-fashion collection called Fisher-Garcia, in what would quickly become a multi-faceted eco-fashion brand at home on top in three short years. But Elena Garcia didn’t just create a fashion line. She created a sustainable fashion company business model with an Eco Credo built upon environmental impact considerations and social justice.  Garcia simply calls it business as usual.

Considering the company’s Eco Credo, one might be inclined to think that what goes round comes round (in a good way) because that certainly seems to have been the case with Elena Garcia. Garcia has been a shooting star in the eco-fashion world since that first collaborative collection.  Garcia remembers that collection fondly.

“That’s the felted jacket that started it all. I still have the original I made from a second hand sari when I was in my first year at the London College of Fashion,” Garcia reminisced.  “It’s unique, comfortable and feels divine.”

Elena Garcia: Simply Sustainable, Socially Just and Totally Beautiful
by Vicki Godal
Images by Nick Fallon

The thing about fashion is it’s a tough business to break into, much less to become a resounding success on the level of Elena Garcia. Garcia has deified the odds and never looked back. In fact, Garcia challenges the very way we traditionally manufacture clothing. When asked if she could do one thing to magically change fashion what it would be, Garcia’s response was crystal clear and concise.

“I would make unsustainable fabrics and practices disappear,” Garcia answered, “So designers and businesses had no option but to do things the right way.”

Garcia’s designs are for every woman. They combine clean lines of elegance with ease of movement. Delightfully intricate cutwork teases the eye. The garments combine the Eastern flowing shapes found in kimono sleeves and Thai fishermen trousers with innovative and flattering asymmetric dresses, skirts and camisoles. Garcia has a defined vision for her line.

“Elena Garcia Eco-Couture is a label that offers high end garments that are made sustainably while appealing to women of all ages and sizes. The aim is to make pieces that will be passed on from one generation to another. Pieces made with great care and attention to detail using flattering shapes and amazing fabrics. Pieces that appeal to the senses of the wearer, “Garcia said.

Elena Garcia: Simply Sustainable, Socially Just and Totally Beautiful
by Vicki Godal
Images by Nick Fallon

All of Garcia’s fabrics, from her luscious bamboo satins to the hand-loomed silk tweeds and silk chiffons are rapidly renewable, sustainable, organic and pesticide free, while the dyes and manufacturing processes are metal, amine and azo free.  All processes are low or no impact on the environment. Garcia described the process and texture of two of her fabrics. The bamboo satin is another of Garcia’s new fabrics. “The bamboo fiber can be woven like a silk satin, it is very silky in its texture and feels amazing, and that’s why it’s called bamboo satin! Nuno felting is a process whereby wool fibers are applied to another fabric. The wool shrinks when in contact with heat which creates friction and gathers the fabric underneath, creating lovely textures,” Garcia explained.

No zips or plastic fasteners here. Instead, Garcia uses natural shell buttons. Sustainable practices reflect in the administrative side of Garcia’s business, as well. Mailings are printed on Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified papers using vegetable inks. 

According to Garcia, “I want people to know that Elena Garcia clothes have very little impact on the environment and have contributed to making people’s lives better. I also want people to know that we have put a lot of care and effort into every process of the life of Elena Garcia garments.”

Elena Garcia: Simply Sustainable, Socially Just and Totally Beautiful
by Vicki Godal
Images by Nick Fallon

As for Garcia’s reason to be, all her collections incorporate the quality handiwork of the underserved communities for whom she once translated.  Garcia gives back to these communities and the local economy by giving them gainful employment with fair wages and desirable working conditions. The fact that traditional clothing manufacturing is quite often entrenched in the opposite of those conditions is another story. However, suffice to say that eco-conscious fashion designers like Garcia are changing the fabric of fashion, literally and operationally, from the ground up.
 
“We work with the HEBA Women’s Project in Brick Lane, London and the XL Consultancy in North London in the development of our patterns and textile finishes,” Garcia said. “Locally, we employ textile artists for our felting and hand-dyeing.”

Even with her ethical sensibilities, Garcia is shrewd when it comes to people’s buying habits as shown in this excerpt from an article written by her friend, London fashion writer Suzy Menke about London Fashion Week for the New York Times in 2008.
“Elena Garcia wanted to make the most glamorous of garments to show that sustainable clothing can have couture quality. Chosen by Estethica as one of the promising new contributors in the field, Garcia and her partner take the view that people will be prepared to pay a high price not because something is organic nor because it helps women who might otherwise struggle to find work – but because it is beautiful.”
 ”People are not just going to spend money on something because it’s organic. With cheap fashion, people have a mental price in their head about how much they’re prepared to pay for a T-shirt,” Garcia added. “We can’t compete with China and the big money factories, so we’ll make something so beautiful that people will want to buy it no matter what.”
Working with textile designers Ilya Fisher and Carolyn Abbott, who do the felting, dyeing, jackets and camisoles, Garcia’s signature fabric is organic silk incorporating Japanese dyeing techniques with her trademark cutwork on silk chiffon. Her upcoming Autumn/Winter 2009 collection, inspired by Queen Victoria and Daphne Guinness, is dominated by black silk satin with a tie dye lightening effect, raw edges and cutwork panels. Silk tunics and floor length evening dresses make up the collection’s key pieces. Garcia also introduces a new fabric, hand-loomed olive brown silk tweed.

Elena Garcia: Simply Sustainable, Socially Just and Totally Beautiful
by Vicki Godal
Images by Nick Fallon

But Garcia isn’t just a fashion designer slash ethical business owner.

“My company is actually called Garcia Eco-Ventures Ltd, Elena Garcia Eco-Couture is one of the entities within the company,” Garcia explained.

In fact, in addition to Elena Garcia Eco-Couture, Garcia also designs the upcycle label “Sew Last Season” using throwaway fabrics and materials. Besides her own collections, Garcia designs and manufactures eco-clothes for other London eco-retailers including Love, Life Stories.  To increase awareness and education, Garcia engages in eco design consultant services and sustainable fashion public speaking and training.

An active member of the Ethical Fashion Forum, The Eco-Designers Network, The Conscious Designers Collective and London Apparel, Garcia believes everyday can be the start of a new mindset and she backs it up with some sage advice, “Think about the environmental and social impact of everything you do. It is hard in the beginning, but once the mindset kicks in, it will change the way you live forever,” Garcia said.

Elena Garcia: Simply Sustainable, Socially Just and Totally Beautiful
by Vicki Godal
Images by Nick Fallon

For more information go to www.elenagarciastudio.com.