Our Copenhagen Fashion Week special continues! Clare sits down with Finnish menswear designer Rolf Ektroth. Last season, his hand-knits , made with Finnish yarn manufacturer Novita, were made available as pattern and yarn kits, so that home knitters could recreate his runway pieces. He loves macramé and hand embroidery, yet his collections have a modern street vibe that feels very polished. Perhaps it's because he's not actually a new name - Rolf Ekroth has been celebrated before, with glowing r...
Aug 14, 2024•28 min•Ep 217•Transcript available on Metacast If you're not in Copenhagen for fashion week, here's your (virtual) ticket :) Last week, we talked to Ane from Alpha about studying fashion in the Nordics and how to make it as an artistic designer. Over the next three episodes, we’ve got interviews with some of the most exciting names to watch from the region. First up is Alectra Rothschild , whose show for her Masculina label was one of the most anticipated, thanks to last season's electric on-schedule debut. Vogue noted it was "probably histo...
Aug 08, 2024•31 min•Ep 216•Transcript available on Metacast We hear it all the time: fashion students are overwhelmed by overproduction and the ruthless churn of creative directors at the big luxury houses. How can they forge a creative path without contributing to the problem? If they decide to operate outside the system - crafting extravagant one offs, for example, or only making to order - how will they survive financially? What is the point of fashion if you can’t wear it? Ane Lynge-Jorlén is the Danish fashion academic behind Alpha, a fashion incuba...
Aug 01, 2024•50 min•Ep 215•Transcript available on Metacast Empathy, kindness, wellbeing, caring, sharing, repairing - not traditionally the first words that spring to mind when I say "FASHION!" But things are changing. Are we moving towards a new paradigm where who cares, wins? If we accept that the old ways (overproduction, exploitation, rampant shareholder capitalism, waste) don't serve us, why not redesign the whole thing along radical new lines? What might that look like? If you're intro underground fabulousness pushing disruptive fashion forwards, ...
Jul 24, 2024•59 min•Ep 214•Transcript available on Metacast Complete this sentence: The future of fashion will be… Welcome to Series 10 of Wardrobe Crisis ! We're kicking off with a conversation about the future of fashion, recorded live earlier this year when Wear Next came out in the UK. Clare is in conversation Tamara Cincik, Professor of Fashion & Sustainability at Bath Spa University , at the first ever event of the UK's new National Centre for Sustainable Fashion , which is based there. A robust discussion beginning with regenerative fashion , ...
Jul 10, 2024•47 min•Ep 213•Transcript available on Metacast What does it take to make it as an independent, small, local ethical business in a global world that favours big brands? How can we work together to ensure that our local businesses and creatives are literally sustainable - in that they thrive and stick around, and continue to give us the awesomeness that, at times, we maybe take for granted? It's not just fashion this applies to, but all the beautiful, unique, heartfelt local businesses that make our neighbourhoods sing - the cafes and f...
May 15, 2024•57 min•Ep 212•Transcript available on Metacast Forget brands for a minute, the real circular fashion economy is the repair shop on your high street… Do you have a fab local cobbler or clothing alterations service? This episode is a reminder to thank them for being here and fixing our stuff. They are cornerstones of the circular fashion economy, and not some distant future dream - they’re already here, and in many cases have been for decades. Honing skills that simply can’t be learned overnight. They’re the best! Here’s to them! Keep giving t...
May 01, 2024•28 min•Ep 211•Transcript available on Metacast Bobby Kolade is the designer behind Ugandan fashion label Buzigahill - which puts the politics of upcycling and waste colonialism at its core with the brilliant, provocative concept: Return to Sender. Buzigahill's collections are made from items of secondhand clothing donated in the global north, and increasingly being dumped on the global south in unsustainable numbers. Why “return to sender”? Because much of Buzigahill’s clientele is in Europe and North America. Like Kantamanto in Accra, Ghana...
Apr 18, 2024•44 min•Ep 210•Transcript available on Metacast What do your clothes say about you? Dear listener, I bet you've thought about this before. Fashion is a language in itself. But, what about the language we use to describe - and by extension to include, or to exclude - the people who wear it? Or don't get to wear it? The people we're marketing it to, or employing. Fashion communication isn't just about the clothes. It's about how we talk to each other. Meet Lou Croff Blake , a Berlin-based non-binary fashion practitioner, scholar, artist and com...
Apr 12, 2024•46 min•Ep 209•Transcript available on Metacast Can fashion lift its inclusivity game? When 28-year-old British model Junior Bishop - who just so happens to be a wheelchair user - spoke at the Houses of Parliament recently, she called on the fashion industry to do more to tackle its disability access issues. Levelling the playing field is integral to the wellbeing economy - what’s the point of only some of us get to have our wellbeing considered? “When looking at fashion and media today,” said Junior, diversity and representation are graduall...
Mar 27, 2024•52 min•Ep 208•Transcript available on Metacast Rich, white and privileged - the creative arts sector has a class problem. Particularly in class-obsessed Britain, where middle-class people are twice as likely to work in creative jobs than their working class contemporaries. According to the Evening Standard , "the worlds of TV, film, music and the arts are dominated by straight, able-bodied white men living in London , despite them only accounting for 3.5% of the [UK] population." Not that this is purely a UK problem. In New York, 85% of arti...
Mar 13, 2024•55 min•Ep 207•Transcript available on Metacast We all know clothes have meaning, beyond just looking nice. We’ve often talked on this podcast about the importance of how they are made. This week, we’re considering how fashion’s meaning stretches beyond supply chains and our wardrobes, to shape our culture and the way we see ourselves collectively. How does fashion see itself when it comes to race and privilege? How about the male gaze? Clare sits down with Caryn Franklin , journalist, style icon, fashion citizen (not consumer, please!), one-...
Mar 06, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Ep 206•Transcript available on Metacast How much is enough? How can creatives incorporate the idea of sufficiency in their output? If you make physical objects, what does it really mean to be sustainable in your practice? And, how can you, as my guest this week, Richard Malone , puts it, "do your own thing and stick to it" in the context of fashion's relentless push for newness? Also, where does class and privilege play into all this? Does Fashion with a capital ‘F’ actually want to be more inclusive and welcoming? Or is all the talk ...
Feb 26, 2024•1 hr•Ep 205•Transcript available on Metacast Why does fashion have such a problem in accepting all bodies they way they are, and recognising the beauty in different shapes and sizes? I know, I know, we’ve heard it all before, yet depressingly little changes. Our guest this week has had enough! Self-described as “that body morphing b*tch”, Michaela Starck is a super-talented London-based Aussie creative director/designer/dreamboat who’s beautiful work includes her own glorious self, as well as Paris-worthy, bow-bedecked frillies. A frank co...
Feb 01, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Ep 204•Transcript available on Metacast If you’re interested in natural dyes , or want to know more about hands-on textile techniques , this episode is a joy. It's also a great one if you are into ideas around seasonality and connection to Nature . Aren't we all?! Continuing our Pacific theme (don’t miss last week’s Episode with Fiji Fashion Week’s Ellen Whippy-Knight) these two stories are also from Fiji, but a long way from its capital Suva. They’re both about different aspects of Indigenous practices , and living in balance with th...
Jan 24, 2024•44 min•Ep 203•Transcript available on Metacast When Anna Wintour was introduced to Ellen Whippy-Knight as the founder of Fiji Fashion Week, the Vogue editor-in-chief exclaimed, “Fiji has a fashion week?!” Sure does, Anna. It turned 16 last year, and is an established force in a small yet burgeoning Pacific fashion scene. White sands and turquoise waters. Surf breaks. Rugby. Fiji is rightly famous for these things, it’s also an international garment-manufacturing country with an independent design community, mainly focused on the local market...
Jan 17, 2024•40 min•Ep 202•Transcript available on Metacast Addicted to thrifting? Wondering where all your money’s gone? Feeling the fashion clutter feels? If you answered “yes” to any of the above, it might be time for a fashion detox. From Slow Fashion Season to ReMake’s 90-day No New Clothes challenge to the Rule of 5, more of us are looking for ways to circuit-break bad fashion habits. There’s a real movement going on with conscious fashionistas sharing what’s worked for them when it comes to slowing down, buying and wasting less. Our first guest fo...
Jan 10, 2024•41 min•Ep 201•Transcript available on Metacast CONTENT WARNING. A note from Clare: "While in this Episode, we talk about creativity and hope, baking and Strictly Ballroom , and address a wide range of things from the politics of climate action to biodiversity, we also discuss the details of going on a hunger strike. Personally, I would say that bit is not suitable for children, although I suspect Gregory would disagree. I'd also like to let you know there's mention of eating disorders in this interview. It's a compelling listen - there's muc...
Dec 06, 2023•1 hr 1 min•Ep 200•Transcript available on Metacast It's that time of year again, when world leaders (along with marketers from brands, oil and gas industry lobbyists, celebs on their private jets) head to the UN climate conference to discuss what to do about greenhouse gas pollution and our warming world. Extreme weather! Rising sea levels! Phasing out fossil fuels! Wait, actually, maybe tone that last one down because it's a bit hard, and our mates in the extractive energy industry aren't keen ... okay, how about: Phasing down fossil fuels? Tha...
Nov 24, 2023•44 min•Ep 199•Transcript available on Metacast “When did we decide we couldn’t make stuff anymore?” asks this week’s guest, Meriel Chamberlin , the textile technologist behind Full Circle Fibres , an Australian startup producing “paddock to product” garments on-shore. We know that the fashion industry’s climate impacts are significant , and that most of it comes down to the textile production stage. So how can we do things differently, close to home? Who needs to come together to make that happen, to share expertise, innovate, and also to fu...
Oct 16, 2023•50 min•Ep 198•Transcript available on Metacast Our guest for this Special Edition interview is JUNO GEMES , one of Australia’s most celebrated contemporary photographers. Born in Hungary, she moved to Australia as a child. In 1970, then a young artist, she spent six months living on Country with Aboriginal communities at Uluru. She went on to documents First Nations activism and the Civil Rights Movement in this country for five decades. Juno photographed many of the early protests and meetings led by Aboriginal activists in the ‘70s and ‘80...
Oct 09, 2023•1 hr 4 min•Ep 197•Transcript available on Metacast In this mini pod, which is Part 1 of our Special Edition on the Voice, you will hear RACHEL PERKINS read you the Uluru Statement from the Heart . Rachel is an Australian filmmaker, a proud Arrernte and Kalkadoon woman and the co-chair of the YES23 campaign. She is also co-chair of Australians for Indigenous Constitutional Recognition, and is a signatory to the Statement from the Heart. “As the largest consensus of First Nations peoples on a proposal for substantive recognition in Australian...
Oct 09, 2023•10 min•Ep 197•Transcript available on Metacast It’s fashion month again and the big brands with the big budgets dominate our feeds. But amidst the commercial noise of the contemporary fashion circus, independent gems still exist. There are true artists who go their own way, and often set the future trend agenda (although they tend not to get the credit). Our guest this week is one of them. He’s been shaking up the London underground scene since the ‘90s. Meet Dr NOKI, the original upcycler. Just don’t call him that… NOKI does fashion on his ...
Oct 05, 2023•57 min•Ep 196•Transcript available on Metacast Woolmark 's new ambassador Taylor Zakhar Perez is a rising Hollywood star known for his leading man roles. You might recognise him from a certain rom com that we're not mentioning here (in respect of the actors' strike), or his role in a royal drama based on a cult book (again, not going there). Maybe you know his Paris fashion week looks - snaps of him emerging shirtless from his car outside the Prada’s menswear show went viral in June. But whether you’re one of his 4.7 million Instagram follow...
Sep 15, 2023•42 min•Ep 195•Transcript available on Metacast Series 9 has landed! Our first guest is Cyrill Gutsch, the fascinating founder of Parley for the Oceans . With his partner Lea Stepken, this NY-based designer and branding expert started his global environmental organisation in 2012, after bumping into Pamela Anderson at an art fair. Pammy was wearing a Sea Shepherd T-shirt, and when Cyrill asked her why, she told him Sea Shepherd’s activist-in-chief Paul Watson was in trouble - he’d been arrested in Frankfurt on an international warrant. Cyrill...
Sep 06, 2023•44 min•Ep 194•Transcript available on Metacast Danish designer Cecilie Bahnsen studied at RCA in London, and interned with John Galliano and Erdem before starting her own label in 2015. You’ve probably seen her voluminous dresses, or her recent sneaker collaboration with ASICs. Cecilie says she operates at the intersection of couture and ready-to-wear – it’s high craft, she creates her own textiles , and loves to use embroidery and smocking which lends her work a certain whimsey. But although expensive, it’s not untouchable, as you will...
Aug 10, 2023•41 min•Ep 193•Transcript available on Metacast Meet Danish creative Henrik Vibskov - fashion designer, costume designer, curator, musician and professor. He shows at Copenhagen Fashion Week (which is coming around again next week) but also Paris, and he has a store in New York. A supremely conceptual designer – his last collection, Long Fingers To Ma Toes, was inspired by the tomato in weird and wonderful ways. In this interview Henrik shares his experience of living up to CPHFW's recently introduced 18 Minimum Sustainability Standards. What...
Aug 03, 2023•46 min•Ep 192•Transcript available on Metacast ICYMI: fashion has a greenwashing problem. No wonder policy makers, consumer watchdogs and NGOs are taking an interest. According to the UN: “Misinformation and greenwashing are ubiquitous ... As sustainability has grown as a selling point, all manner of vague and inflated claims have appeared across advertising, marketing, media, packaging and beyond.” Enter the UN's new Sustainable Fashion Communication Playbook , an open-access guide that seeks to change that, while better aligning how the fa...
Jul 26, 2023•52 min•Ep 191•Transcript available on Metacast Hang on, what's the question? Why is everyone talking about regenerative farming , for starters. For fibre as well as food. #regenag is fashion's new favourite hashtag. What if we put back more than we took out? Stopped drenching the land with toxic chemicals? Worked in harmony with Nature ? Could we feed and clothe the world if we produced less, and differently? Would we starve? Would prices skyrocket? How did we get to this place, where no one - not the land, not biodiversity, not the nutritio...
Jul 19, 2023•53 min•Ep 190•Transcript available on Metacast There's much debate around the sustainability credentials of leather vs vegan alternatives (most of which are still PU - polyurethane). Is one natural and bio-degradable and the other simply plastic? Sorry, but it's not that simple, not least because today's global supply chains are so long and complex. Then there's all the toxic substances used in conventional tanning. And we haven't even talked about animal cruelty yet. But amidst the confusion, there are obviously better ways to do it than cu...
Jun 30, 2023•1 hr 7 min•Ep 189•Transcript available on Metacast 
