In the past few years, there has been an increase in popularity and demand for sustainable fashion. This is obvious with big brands coming out with eco-friendly options and campaigns such as ‘Conscious’ by H&M. People are now becoming more familiar with the environmental impact of the fashion industry with the increase in engaging social media posts on Tiktok and Instagram. Before continuing with my findings, we’ll define what a sustainable fashion brand is.
A sustainable fashion brand is when a brand is conscious about the environmental and socio-economic aspects of their product’s life cycle which includes the design, raw material, manufacturing, transport, storage, marketing and shipping.
The aim of such a brand is to provide essential wardrobe pieces that’ll last for a long time or in other words an investment. Another is to provide an ethical environment where workers are treated and paid well unlike the lack of fair trade done by the fast fashion companies. With that said, here is one of the sustainable fashion brands that have successfully marketed to the global market with practices that are worth looking up to.
This is A Love Song AKA TIALS
This is a Love Song was found back in 2010 by Stephanie Vermaas. Her brand has grown from being sold locally to internationally with big Hollywood artists wearing them. She started this brand in Bali to create clothes that she would love to wear as there was no Zare or H&M back then. She found the gap in the market for everyday basics that is street style and cute which is why her first release was T-shirts and singlets. Her biggest sustainable pillar is to support the local Balinese community and economy.
She developed products with upcycled material and premium eco-friendly materials. After successfully creating a full womenswear collection, she reached out to sales agents that she found on the internet and was able to export her products to big retails stores such as Urban Outfitters, Revolve, Nastygal got featured in multiple magazines such as Nylon, Forbes, Harper’s Bazaar and many more.
Whilst providing for the international retail stores, her manufacturing company has grown to more than 45 people with ethical practices such as fair wage above the national standard, proper working hours, lunch on the house, providing health insurance and retirement plans and many more.
As she grows older, she rebranded the brand by focusing on creating designs that are essential with a city and sporty vibe as they have branched out in Los Angeles. Aside from creating such designs, they are sustainable as they minimize waste by manufacturing in small batches or have a pre-order system, they source their materials locally, use sustainable fabric options for 70 percent of their collection, obey the zero plastic policy in Bali and a lot more which can be found in the TIALS’s website.
Author : Wang Lusi, Student of Product Design Engineering
