Arts
They’ve got sustainability on their mind
With the goal of bringing together brands that have a common cause, looking at what is happening in the world and around them and the emerging fashion revolution, co-founders of The Design Collective (TDC), Binu Wickramasinghe and Shahili Gomes last month launched the Sustainable Edit.
The Sustainable Edit is a space dedicated to select brands that champion change within the fashion industry supply chain, and comply with the six core principles of sustainability identified by the Design Collective team.
“The Sustainable Edit has been something that we have been wanting to do for sometime now. We wanted to bring a group of designers who want to work in sustainability in some way or the other even if it is just in one aspect of their system to start being more sustainable,” says co-founder of The Design Collective (TDC) Binu Wickramasinghe explaining that designers sign up with them with the intention of eventually complying with the six principles of sustainability that have been identified.
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- Senuri Perera
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- Maria Domingos with a Bubu bag
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- Binu Wickramasinghe
Marketing executive Senuri Perera walked us through the six principles that are to reduce chemical usage, waste, use recycled materials, employ local artisans, guarantee fair wages and ensure products are animal-cruelty free. “We wanted consumers to understand how a brand is sustainable and we chose these values and matched it with icons so consumers know at a glance how they are sustainable.”
Designer Maria Domingos who founded Bubu explained the concept. “ Bubu is all about reusing materials after their primary use and for our items we use gunny bags that I saw commonly used in markets of Colombo and recycled them into handbags,” she tells us emphasizing that they strive to adhere to a ‘one-bag, zero-waste’ policy where even the leftover material is converted into purses. The bags and purses are designed in a way that they are very lightweight as the elastic straps take all the weight for you and some of the bags are reversible giving you two bags for the price of one.
The Sustainable Edit at ‘The Design Collective Edit’ store located at 70, Rosmead Place has brands such as House of Lonali, Sthri by Selyn, Kantala, Ethno, Ileana the label, Nithya, Mint Ceylon, Nakota Tuwa, Pigeon Island, Bubu, Salvage, Satat, Organic source and supply, Sustainablee, Beauty by Rosh, Amilani Perera, Leekoh, Koca by RN, Itr by Kyati Pandi, Bootek, Mala Yoga, De’Anma, NAD, Sangeeta Boochira, Swarang, Summerhouse and Suaroma.