Sustainable Talks with N&N

In this talk you will learn at what you should pay attention if you want to make a sustainable brand and a sustainable design. Silvia started to work on sustainable design since 2009 and she build up something special: an holistic approach that goes beyond the marketing campaigns. One of our best talk ever, super inspiring with a great knowledge that really goes into the detail of the issue. Thank you Silvia

Starting from a waste material (leather skin) using another waste to make the tanning. This is a great example of a real circular product. A new way to tan leather with the waste of the olive trees. We are used to Chrome tanning, vegetable Tanning and lately to Chrome free tanning that is not always more sustainable. This new method it seems to have all the characteristic of all the above. In this case you do not need to look for leather alternatives materials because they will have or bigger impact (petrol) or/and a shorter life. In this talk, Thomas, not only share with us his view on leather, circularity and sustainability but gives us more details on this product.

Black dyes are is the most used color and it is mostly synthetic (petrol base). This talk with the funder of Nature Coatings bring us into a natural way of making black dyes from WOOD WASTE.

Everybody talks about circularity in the fashion industry, but what does it exactly means? Is the fashion industry circular? How can we make a profitable business model with circularity? Thanks to Elena Ferrero to share with us her project, Re4circular, that is looking into digitise the sorting process of recycling clothes. Together with Sara Secondo they founded a female social start up, Atelier Riforma to solve the biggest issue that brands has: how to collect and sort old clothes? You cannot do it yourself, unless you are one of the 5 giant in the world, but even there you need to make sure to don't mix material compositions that won't be possible to recycle. Recycling companies are not always profitable in a sustainable way as the sorting process can be very time consuming. Technology need to help fashion and that's why we love this project Good luck Elena & Sara

Denim can be one of the most polluting material. This is why MUD jeans has born tackling the challenge of making this industry more sustainable. MUD Jeans is one of the first B Corp that not only reduce the environmental impact of the production process but also take care of the end of life of the product driving into a circular model. Doing this they save: -93% of water -73% of CO2 -51% biodiversity impact How can they do that? Post Consumer Recycled cotton, innovative technologies (as foam dyeing) and good chemical mangement are the key pillars for this shift of mindset. Yes, "recycle" become one of the most popular word in the last 12 months, but how can we collect enough old clothes and what we do with that? Accepting that not everything can be solved at once but pushing the boundaries makes the fashion industry closer and closer to the perfect set up What is the role and what are the limits of certifications? They need to support the fashion industry and the final customer to share the right message in an understandable way. Should it be done from an NGO or through a government regulation we don't know yet but there is still room to make the sustainable claims more understandable and clear. And of course we can't miss traceability, Regenerative farming and more... Thank you so much Laura Vicaria former CSR Manager MUD Jeans to push the boundaries to the next level and to share it with us.

In this talk Alberto tell us how to become a B-corporation in 2 years from 0. 

They created and patented a new model called Re3 to Recycle, Reuse and Regenerate old garments. 

They are the first one that don't only take back their own clothes and give a discount but also other brands clothes, that's the game changer. And you ask "How do I know where my garment goes?"  Though a QR code you can trace your old garment and see where it goes.  

This and more, including the importance of certification and the use of the world SUSTAINABILITY

Joe Pringle the Co-Founder of Veshin Factory talk with us a bout his journey.

 If the meaning of vegan food is clear and understandable the meaning of a vegan bag is not. 

Of course a bag will never eat meat. Especially when we associate the meaning of sustainability with the word vegan in fashion it is a clear greenwashing. No animal is killed because of leather in fact leather is a byproduct from the meat industry that would be burned otherwise. Until a certain extend we could consider this material as a circular bio material. Circular because it comes from a waste and his durability is the longest of all the materials as well it can be repaired. 

But if your factory embrace Buddhism you can't of course use leather and you start to look into alternatives materials that are not the easiest ones to industrialise. 

Joey also looks beyond a common factory mindset as profit is not everything but wellbeing of the employee has also a crucial role in his view. 

Can the fashion industry make also this step and don't think only about have higher turnover but a better wellbeing? 

Looking at the most popular fashion magazines it seems we are still very far from there.  

Thank you joey for sharing with us your view and to open up our mind into a different challenges we do not always think

How to hack a life situation and make your dreams come true. 

How many time you need to go to a special event, gala, party, wedding etc... and you do not have high budget to spent for one time dress but you still want to look memorable? 

Most of this clothes are used once or twice and stay all your life in the wardrobe Waste of money, resources and space.  

Trisha Bantigue (Forbes under 30) and Kathy Zhou founded Queenly, the number one formal reselling platform,  to solve this issue

How is it difficult to look for a sustainable garment? 

First of all you need to know what is sustainability for you. 

Then you need to search into the multitude of brands that claim to be sustainable but they are only greenwashing. 

Iris tell how she is trying to solve this issue with other 3 Italians co-founder and un app called Renoon. They created a platform that gives you a selection of brands and fashion items based on your sustainability preferences.  

In less than a year from starting the company, the team has been internationally recognised by WWD, FashionUnited, Vogue Business, DutchNews etc. and is among the 70 top change makers in Europe for 2020 according to Sifted from Financial Times.  

Renoon’s CEO is among Forbes Under 30 list for 2021 and the team as a whole is a young (at heart) and dynamic group putting high skills, talent and passion into something positive for the world.    

www.renoon.com

Anna Mello Rella spent all her life studying natural plant dye in her  dye house Tintoria di Quaregna.  

With her passion of the nature she started already in the 90's to experiment the dyes with herbs that now become a trend. 

Who better than her can tell us how it is working?  

She can produce plant dye with the same technical specification of chemical dye in more than 60 different colours.  

Every color may need up to 10 herbs to be made.  

Lately she funded a brand called AMR Natural Colours where she use this natural dye with all certified material. You can find her product also in the Italian retail sustainable platform Green Pea  

Thank you Anna, you are an example!

Today we go out of our comfort zone and learn something new from an apparently different industry: GOLD  

Diana Culillas, Secretary General of the Swiss Better Gold Association (SBGA), guide us into the supply chain of gold  After giving us an overview of the gold supply chain she goes into the hot topic of the small-artisanal mining, the ones that we see in the most difficult conditions also from Netflix's documentary. 

There is a community that can't be left alone and need to have support to escape from a certain condition. 

We are talking about people that doesn't have much choice in life than working for very artisanal and sometimes illegal organisation.  

They would born somewhere else if they could but who can?  

Diana and her team make an incredible job linking this part of the society with Swiss Gold brand as Chopard, Cartier, Richemont, etc... and gives a second chance to those communities also allowing the brands to have a real impact in the society

Mechanical Recycling or Chemical Recycling? 

At first we thought that Chemical recycling will be more impactful for the environment but going deeper with Susanna she teach us something different.  

Susanna knows the fashion materials very well, from the chemical composition and she promote the innovations focusing on sustainable process and products  

Not only this, she will bring us into some real examples that we have seen in the news lately explaining what it means

http://www.cardato.it/en/en-home/

https://mudjeans.eu

https://www.renewcell.com/en/

https://circulo.se

https://infinitedfiber.com

A topic that is still very new but also very old: Mycelium   

With his great knowledge and very pleasant colloquiality, Maurizio guide us into this world between provocations and dreams  

He is Founder of Officine Corpuscoli, an Amsterdam based design start up, and Co-Founder of the Italian branch of it the North of Italy.  

How does this material works? 

What has not being said until now and what is it hidden behind very disruptive marketing campaigns?

This are only few of the topics of our longest and organic podcast so far.

https://mogu.bio

https://www.corpuscoli.com

If you are a leather person (and not only...) you don't want to miss this episode  

Stephen Sothmann, president at LHCA (Leather and Hide Council of America) guide us into the status of one of the biggest producer of raw leather in the world, US.  

Starting from an industry that is more and more under pressure he shares what's the truth. 

From the achievement on animal welfare through BQA (Better Quality Assurance) to the difficulties still in place to have 100% traceability and a clear LCA. 

 But also what is the real cattle green house gas emission and what has not been said about the alternatives materials  

This a more in this very insightful and inspiring conversation.

https://www.usleather.org

https://www.bqa.org

The fashion world seen from an outsider, Dr. Ioannis Ioannou  

Dr Ioannou is a strategy scholar whose research focuses on Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). More specifically, he seeks to understand whether, how, and the extent to which the modern business organization contributes towards building a sustainable future. His academic work evolves around two main themes: a) understanding how the broader investment community perceives, evaluates and reacts to corporate engagement with, and integration of, environmental and social issues into strategy and b) understanding the multiple and multilevel factors that may affect the corporate decision to adopt environmentally and socially responsible strategies.

Interview with Michael Sondergaard and Birgitte Holgaard Langer ideators of a new project that make leather traceable 

From Farm to Shoes  

The only way to make sure a product is sustainable is to know what is inside In this case you don't need to ask but all the info are in a QR code

What is Metal Free Leather? 

Can Leather be sustainable?  

In most of the case Metal Free leather is a more sustainable option, especially for Be Green that went through a crowdfunding round (the first tannery ever) to push the sustainability to the next level.  

But not all the leather can be done in this tanning. In this cases we talk about ovine leather that are usually tanned without chrome

How to use the technologies and atomisation to make Fashion more Efficient and Sustainable  

How to read the trends with technologies is also an hot topic. 

Read the trend means focus your product to the need of the public

Write a Love Letter to your garment as new way to approach Sustainability in Fashion 

Teach Sustainable Fashion is something very new and very complex. 

Think with the end of product from the material point of view to the design. 

How to avoid the greenwashing and to make sure to use the word Sustainable in an appropriate way

Andrea Kennedy, teacher at LIM college tell us how she created an university curse in Sustainable Fashion

How to go from linear design to circular design  

The importance of certifications

What can an NGO as Solidaridad can support emerging countries with leather

ID Factory is a start up mindset company that aim to bring transparency and traceability into the fashion supply chain

Many companies talk about recycled ocean plastic, but only few does it for real.

Tide is the only one able to make a fabric exclusively out of only this material

The cover the complete chain, from picking up the bottle until the finish fabric

Thomas tell us how he did it out of Switzerland

The Funder of the online school The Footwearists, will drive us into the sustainability of footwear

From recycled material to circularity and the challenges of the shoes

Goes into detail of the green washing that fashion brand does, analysing what is true and what is just a nice story

A life inside a sustainable brand Eileen Fisher.

Amy Hall started the concept of sustainability 25 years ago.

Now there is a different way to approach it and different point of view

Giuseppe Valenza gives us his idea of sustainability

From the materials to design with respect in mind he guide us through the steps to build a menswear brand

Silk is already a natural material, it's true.

But there are different ways to make it, and not everybody makes regenerative agricolture silk

Why Italian leather is very popular?

Luca Boltri from the Italian Leather Association will tell us who they manage to do this

They manage about 140 tanneries in Italy

They support train them to make sure they are not only at the highest standards of sustainability but also of quality and innovation

Leather in China is not yet sustainable, most of the time

Francis and Jorgen have a goal, to make the Chinese leather industry more sustainable

And not only, they also want to create awareness to the Asian customers to make a more conscious choice 

Not easy job, but for sure valuable and futuristic

Can we make a material out of mushrooms?

apparently yes, and one more things...

is not only a material but a complete Supply Chain

to grow the material directly in the share 

Aniela, founder of MycoTEX will explain us how

Can a Far East tannery be sustainable?

Is true, there are not many.

In this podcast Asad will explain us how a Pakistan Tannery need to be the best in class in all the aspects to make the difference

Interview with Hannes Parth, the Founder of Frumat and the Appleskin

Appleskin is an innovative material that is similar to Polyurethane but sobstitute until 50% of the petrol impact

A journey of 12 year that finally bring him to the highest level of fashion materials

Carl Flach, Sr. Director of Operation and Sustainability in ISA tech, one of the biggest leather group in the world

They have tanneries in 3 continents, Asia, USA and Europe and they always did sustainability without knowing

The best example how efficiency improvement can drive sustainability with cost saving, instead of cost adding

Interview with Rob Price, a NYC based handbags designer that worked for the biggest brands around as Coach and Michael Kors

He will drive us to discover how is it possible to design a sustainable products with the right mindset and end in mind

WE will touch base also on 3D ,  Innovative materials and more

Interview with the Deborah Taylor, Managing Director of Sustainable Leather Foundation

She worked 5 years for the Leather Working Group, the biggest worldwide organisation, when we talk about tannery certification

Yes leather can be sustainable when treated in the right way, but how do we explain this to the final customer?

Sustainability and innovation with Panos Mytaros, the CEO of ECCO Leather the more experimental tannery in the world

We talk about the environmental impact and traceability of leather to make some clarity

The latest material that are coming out and the future of the leather and non leather industry

Fashion can be more sustainable

Interview with the Jarno Tagliarini, CEO of one of the leading company Coronet

We will look into the good and bad of this material and what is the future of it

We introduce ourselves and our purpose to create clarity and transparency in the Fashion supply chain industry.