GreenShows Highlight Chic Sustainable Style

British designer Gary Harvey aims to create "dramatic new silhouettes" from discarded materials.

We recently told you about our efforts to green our wardrobe, so we were pleased to see The GreenShows return to New York City last week (just in time to balance out the fur trend in evidence on many of the fall/winter runways!). The four-day event, hosted at 311 E11: Village Green, a new condo development planned as the first LEED Gold-certified building in the East Village, featured a resource-conscious backdrop made entirely out of recycled and compostable material, from recycled paper to repurposed construction wood.

London-based designer Gary Harvey kicked off the festivities with his show “Fashion with a Conscience,” a whimsical-looking collection inspired by vintage couture. Harvey’s upcycling of materials such as wedding gowns and Financial Times newspapers made visually and intellectually bold statements. “The wedding dress is one of the most wasteful garments made to be worn once, and then either stored or discarded,” Harvey says. “The handiwork in these dresses is often done by low-paid workers who receive a fraction of the cost of the dresses’ final cost.”

Other GreenShows standouts included vegan coats by Chicago label Vaute Couture (mentioned in a previous post), timeless organic-cotton and -wool pieces in black and gray from Toronto-based Thieves by Sonja den Elzen, and gorgeously draped organic-cotton tops by Keia Bounds of New York line Willian. “Only designers who had a complete collection of sustainable, fair-trade pieces — instead of a few items here and there — were accepted,” says show founder Eric Dorfman.

Beyond the GreenShows, we’re excited to see more and more designers adopt sustainable style, from Mimi Plange’s use of cork leather in edgy suiting for Boudoir D’huîtres to Susan Woo’s environmentally conscious line of wearable wools and silks. Who’s your favorite green designer?

Photo credit: Paul O. Colliton

Tags: Boudoir D’huîtres, Chicago, designer, Eric Dorfman, favorite green designer, Financial Times, Financial Times Group Ltd, Gary Harvey, LEED Gold-certified building, London, Mimi Plange, New York, New York City, Paul O. Colliton, Recycling, Sonja den Elzen, Susan Woo, Sustainability, Sustainable design, Toronto, Upcycle