Ethics

At the heart of every fashion business should be a commitment to social responsibility.

I encourage and support brands to work with factories who have a safe working environment, pay a living wage, provide reasonable working hours, holiday, sick leave entitlements and maternity/ paternity leave. My hope is to see the rise of progressive factories who consult with staff and provide opportunities for professional growth, a sense of satisfaction with their work, and inclusive training programs to assist those who are vulnerable or victims of exploitation to gain meaningful employment.

At Lovely People Studio, we specialise in design and technical, and don't manage production. However, I have wonderful agents I now work with and refer to, who can assist you to source ethical factories, fabrics and printers. I am more than happy to share these contacts with my clients.

Understanding the cost of running a small fashion business, I have both exclusive and non-exclusive licensing in the shop. Both of these give brands the rights to use artwork for their collections in an ethical manner, ensuring the designer who created it is fairly paid for their work.

Since launching the studio, I have made a commitment that for any aspect of the business, to only hire contractors who are also paid a living wage per hour/ project. Lovely People Studio’s current freelancers reside in Australia, and are paid a rate as quoted by the them, well above award rates. And as the studio is online, they also have the opportunity to choose projects they feel aligned to, with flexible working hours and days to suit them.

Sustainability 

With climate change a reality, now more than ever it’s important for all of us to consider our ecological footprint. For fashion brands, this means continuous research and development to improve or establish more eco-friendly processes across the supply chain. From the design and sourcing phase, manufacturing, through to packaging, repair and recycling of the product. Assessing the raw fibre source, considering land use and water consumption, chemicals involved in processing, finishing and printing, and the impact of waste (both from offcuts/ unused stock and damaged garments). Sustainability goes hand in hand with ethical practices, as what is best for the planet is best for the people, too.

I acknowledge that this is not easy for any business, let alone an emerging fashion brand. It takes time, and very few brands are doing this perfectly. But, we don’t need to be perfect to make a difference. By making a consistent effort and small steps, even choosing one thing to tackle each season- you can help to shape the fashion industry for future generations to come.

Since Lovely People Studio opened in 2018, we have only worked on development and consultancy projects with brands that I believe are taking these steps towards responsible manufacturing. As of late 2019, access to the online print shop is also now open to brands who are committed to improve in this area, appropriate to the stage of business they are in. While I cannot control the production of any prints purchased on the site, I can no longer in good conscience accept applications from fast fashion brands who are not making any visible effort towards a more sustainable and ethical business model.

I support brands to make more responsible choices, and education on how to do so. I have some wonderful contacts I can refer you to for the purchase of sustainable fabrics, and the sourcing of environmentally friendly dyes and printing. As with ethical sourcing, I am more than happy to share these contacts with you.

Animal Welfare

When I became vegan 20 years ago, I made a decision to not purchase new products derived from the mistreatment of animals. Leather and sheepskin particularly, which is a co-product of the meat industry (not a byproduct), not only contributes to the unnecessary death of a beautiful creature, but also has a significantly damaging environmental impact when it is chemically processed. Traditional silk is obtained by boiling the silkworms alive, and goose or duck down is still sadly often live plucked. I have a heavy heart thinking about these things. It has shaped my career- as I wasn't comfortable working in roles where I would be required to design with fabrics that were contributing to the suffering of animals.

For a long time, luxury products in the fashion industry have often meant the exploitation of, and cruelty to animals. Today, there are so many wonderful alternatives to these fabrics. Fruit and vegetable vegan leather (there's even one made from wine waste!), Tencel, fruit silks… fabrics that feel and wear beautifully, and are sustainable in their growing, processing and finishing. It is an exciting time in fashion right now, with the development of more vegetarian and vegan friendly fabrics that are people and planet friendly, too.

I know fashion can be luxurious and beautiful without causing harm. For this reason, Lovely People Studio does not knowingly work on development projects with fabrics derived from the mistreatment of animals, such as traditional silk, leather, wool obtained by unethical farming practices, down or fur.

Minimising Waste

I have seen thousands of unsold fabric artwork headers in textile studio archives, and artworks purchased gathering dust in boxes fashion companies. I have watched the latter being eventually sent to landfill, and realised many of them had not been used at all beyond the digital file. Subsequently, I made the decision not to print fabric headers and ship them across the globe for showings. Lovely People Studio is an online textile design studio, which allows my clients to view prints online, from anywhere in the world.

While fabric headers can sometimes be useful for colour matching, in my experience many fabric printers still have difficulty matching to them, and will request colour codes to match to. As many of my clients are also changing or tweaking colours to suit the rest of their collections, this alone brings the value of a fabric header into question. Because of this, colour matching for existing colourways is a complimentary service with the purchase of each print, reducing strike off waste. Headers are only printed on request, should the client require one.

All border prints are created with separated borders and a repeating main pattern tile. This allows you to modify the print layout to suit the cutting lay, maximise printed fabric usage, and minimise fabric waste. For some ideas on how you can do this, take a look at this post on insta.

Many of prints in the shop are two way or four way prints where at all possible, which enables pattern pieces to be placed in several directions, decreasing the fabric yield per garment, leading to less offcuts.

Reducing waste during development is beneficial for both brand profit and the planet, and ways to do this will be unique to each brand. This is considered during project development, and I am happy to consult with you on yield, ways to utilise offcuts, and how you can take steps towards circularity in considering the end life of products, post-consumer purchase.