How I set up a sustainable fashion brand

What the first year of setting up my sustainable brand looked like

A month by month account of setting up a sustainable, up-cycling fashion brand

As It has been a whole year since I started my own label I wanted to think back and reflect on the process. This is slightly longer first blog post than intended, but it felt timely and fitting to start with it with the journey of my last year.

I quit my job as Design Assistant at House of Holland almost exactly a year ago and, after a few weeks break in Mexico, I sat down and thought what shall I do?

APRIL

I felt I had a responsibility, as a designer, to create fashion in a way that did not continue to harmfully impact the world and environment. I found a course online in Fashion and Sustainability run by the Centre for Sustainable Fashion (CSF) which helped educate me on a wide range of issue of sustainability in fashion. 

The main issue I was drawn to was the huge amount of garments and textiles sent to land-fill each year and the vast quantity of waste within the fashion industry.  I decided to set up my own label that would be made solely from unwanted clothing and textiles, reinvented into new pieces as a way to provide an alternative approach that did not require any new resources. By deciding on the solution I wanted my brand to solve, I have been able to fully orientate my design, sourcing and production process around this.

MAY

My first issue was where to source the clothes from. I wanted to use clothes that were not wanted by other people and so, although sourcing from charity shops was one way I could it, I felt these clothes were still able to be purchased and that I’d rather use clothes that could not be. After chatting to a shop assistant in Traid, I decided to email their warehouse and see if there were clothes that were not able to be sold. This was successful and I went to their warehouse and they let me join onto the conveyor. The items are sorted into seasons for reselling and I stood at the end and took the clothes that could not be sold. Quite a few items are not able to be resold due to quality, wear, stains ext. I pulled off a range of items and carried them back home to assess. 

The next stage of research, designing and remaking is the part I enjoy the most. I made a few mood boards and worked on the stand, draping the garments and playing around with how they looked. I tested cutting items up and draping them on the stand and mixing pieces together. 

Up to this stage I’d been working at home and am found the whole process amazing but a bit lonely being on my own all day. i had 2 jobs; in a pub at the evenings and in a cafe at the weekends meaning I had basically no time for a social life as I was either too tired or everyone was at work when I was free.

MAY/JUNE

I found a studio space where I could pay per hour to keep my costs down but have access to machines and table space. Singer, J Grrey, had messaged me asking me to make her an outfit for Glastonbury which gave me a great opportunity to start making and move on from the design development stage (which can be distracting). I panelled workwear shorts together and made an oversized tracksuit jacket and track trousers, creating a one-off tracksuit.

I went on to make other the items that I has designed using the clothes from TRAID. I used old bed sheets to toile and test my patterns - people often donate them and its a great way to reuse them. I rented a permeant space in the studio which gave me good routine and sense of community, working around other people. I ended up quitting the cafe at the end of June so that I had my weekend day time back and worked in the pub in the evenings.

JULY

I set a date for the end of July to do a photoshoot of the collection. I felt I had made quite a few pieces by this point and wanted to give myself a focus/target to work towards. I spent the rest of the month sewing all the clothes for the shoot. The collection was 6 main looks with a number of additional tops. Everything was created from unwanted clothing that I unpicked, cut and remade. The shoot went really well and the people I worked with were amazing - creating beautiful images. The photographer was Zeinab Batchelor with Katie Allen assisting her (@zei.bei / @ktallen0), the floral set was by Callie Pettigrew (@calliepettigrewstylist), the make up and hair by Tilly Jone (@tillyjonesmakeup) and the model was Maine from contact.agency (@maine.telan).

AUGUST

At this point I'm thinking how will I make this a business. The last 3 months have been great and really creative but I need to focus myself as a brand.  The main issues I faced were how to do small scale production in terms of sourcing and production, pricing, how/where to sell. I spent this month doings CADS, tech packs, line sheets and costings for the collection.

SEPTEMBER

After chatting with a couple of stores that didn't quite work out, INNEOSS reached out and were opening their new shop in October. The girls, G and Nat, were so lovely and I really appreciated the opportunity to be stocked with them (@inneoss). I spent the rest of the month unpicking, cutting and sewing items to make for this. Working out how to produce these items was a challenge - I made several trips back to the TRAID warehouse to get more unwanted clothes and found it was almost impossible to get multiples of the same thing. I realised most of my items would always be a one-off due to this and colour pallets must be flexible depending on what was available. The unpicking/cutting is slow process yet I felt that this was where the process became a craft due to the time and care I put in deconstructing each piece. Each panel is cut one by one to most effectively use the unwanted garment - unlike in normal production where multiple panels will be cut out at once. Next door to the studio was a small factory who are happy to help me construct couple of items but as the cutting is integral to the design process I did this all myself. The factory made a couple of t-shirts and bodices for me and the rest was made by me.

OCTOBER

The start of the month I continue to make the items for INNEOSS. A student at Kingston reached out to me to do an internship. Samara was amazing and its was helpful having someone to assist with the work (@_samarakate_). As mentioned, I set up my business around the issue of reducing waste so this is the main influence for my decision making. I needed to get labels and swing tags made but did not want new materials/resources to be used. I decided to use scrap calico (waste from the studio I rent a space in) and have my logo screen printed - these were done by Melissa who has a space in a screen printing studio in Peckham (@_melissafry). Finding alternative ways to do things, other than buying a new item (that has required new resources to be produced) is a constant process within my brand and I aim to ensure everything is reused from something else. I did a shoot with Chi Virgo (@chivirgo) with photographer Jess (@jesselizaross) capturing some really beautiful images of the clothes before they were delivered in INNEOSS.

NOVEMBER

I’d started to have a conversation with NICCE about the prospect of doing a collaboration with them and so began to research and think about this. I was meant to add items to my website and start focusing on sales but being creative, I got distracted by the new project. I was invited to make mini kit bags at JGrrey's UGH x NIKE launch where the guests bring their unwanted clothing and I remade them at the party. This was the first event where I made things live and it was a really fast pace, busy experience but totally in keeping with my brand values. My friend Charlotte helped and it definitely wouldn't have been possible without her. I'm very grateful for all the help and advice Charlotte gives me all time (@charlotte_hogben).

The collaboration with NICCE was confirmed and I would be making a new collection using their dead-stock! The details of the project were left up to me, giving me full creative freedom. I really appreciated this and them trusting in my aesthetic and abilities as I know, from experience as a design assistant that this is rare. It gave me an excellent way to develop my brand and skills - providing a solution for unwanted garments in the form of their unsold, dead-stock.

DECEMBER

I continued on the NICCE project, researching, designing and making. The process was slow as I carefully unpicked the garments, piece by piece, ironed and remade them. There were lots of interesting sports wear fabrics to work with like white reflective jackets, raincoats and silver fabric. I worked fairly intuitively and create each look in a colour group, draping on the stand, experimenting with frills, gathering, ruching with elastic channels and panelling. I wanted to create a mix of wearable pieces and over-the-top as I had the creative freedom to do so. I wanted to create pieces that could be used for performances and photo shoots so that I could open the conversation of reusing unwanted clothing and dead-stock on a large platform. Along side these pieces, I created panelled vests and tops that were wearable and sellable. 

JANUARY

This month is a lot of hard work to get the collection together. The proposed dead-line for the collection was the start of Feb so was loosely in keeping with LFW (this was later moved as there was no need for the collection to launch during LFW and we decided in March near International Women's Day was a better fit). Due to the way I work, it is all very labour intensive and I sit for hours unpicking everything - even the ribbed neck line on t-shirts to reuse them. My mum came down and helped me to cut and unpick for a day or two. I remember feeling concerned at the start of the month that there was quite a lot to do and not that much time to do it. I think I had 1 out of 5 looks full completed. The main thing I do when I feel like this is plan. I break everything down into groups and into the most basic task by task steps. Building your own brand often is overwhelming and so I try to take a practical approach of how to deal with it and make a thorough time plan.

FEBUARY

I finished the collected by the time I intend to - mainly thanks to a detailed critical path and being focusesd. NICCE were really happy with it too which is great and the main team I worked with there, Sarah, Mia and Naomi were super encouraging and supportive - I am so grateful for the opportunity they gave me to develop my brand and create a new collection from their dead-stock. We planned the photoshoot and shot the collection. The photographer, Nwaka (@byNwaka), has a dreamy, efferial style which I love and thought would add another dimension to the work. The shoot went really well and the photos were amazing!! Mia (@mia_edie) did the creative production, Tilly did the hair and make up (@tillyjonesmakeup), the model was Daniela (@that.daniela). 

After the shoot was done and the launch was being organised by NICCE I felt like, for the first time in a while, I could take a step back and relax for a minute. While I did this, I realised I never set up my items to sell on my website, haven't put any energy into promoting my work or taken myself as a brand or business very seriously. I’d had a great time being creative though! I had started listening to podcasts which really help me to learn and identify all the things I hadn't been doing as a small business - the main ones I listened to were Winging it by Lucy Hitchcock, The Fashion Feed by Elizabeth Styles, Starting the Conversation by Alice Benham and She Can, She Did by Fiona Greyson. These podcast are all hosted by female founders, the tips and ideas I learned from these have had a huge, motivational influence on me.

MARCH

This last month my collaboration for NICCE launched - we hosted a workshop where I introduced and explained the process behind the collection, made some mini kit bags out of remaining scraps and chatted about sustainability in fashion. The collection was received and really felt the love from everyone. 

I spent some time thinking about how I wanted to grow my brand. I am extremely passionate about sustainability and want to share the importance! I thought workshops would be a good extension of my work and allow me to share the process of remaking clothing with more people. I had the idea in the back of my mind for a few weeks and finally organised my thoughts. The first workshop was going to be t-shirt workshop where guests learn how to cut up and sew their old tops into a new one (sadly due to CV19 this was postponed but I can't wait to relaunch it when I can!) 

I did a product shoot for my website with Sophia (@sophialonglegs) and a wonderful photographer. I finally added items to my website!!! This has been on my to do list since November... I would recommend anyone starting their own business does this sooner than I did but when you work mainly on your own and there's aways a 100 things to do, some key things get missed.

In March I was featured as Miss Vogue’s Girl on a Mission which was a huge honour and has been a great way to round up the year.

I hope you have enjoyed my first year review and have gained an insight of the journey I've been on setting up my sustainable fashion brand. I've mentioned some issues but haven't mentioned many of the emotional side - Ive felt worried, anxious and overwhelmed a lot of the time and been constantly unsure about what to do or if it was any good. I have always just kept moving and working, tried to be positive and focused on the fact I believe I fully believe in my ethos and the goal for the brand.

Im so grateful for the support and encouragement I've had from so many people along the way - thank you!!

LB x