Fashion Week Goes Green
Eco-fashion shows were all the rage for the recent Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week at Smashbox Studios. But it remains to be seen whether green will be more than a trend for this glamorous biannual industry showcase.
Mikey Koffman produced The Green Initiative Humanitarian Fashion Show on Oct. 17 at Smashbox Studios in Culver City, Calif. It was the debut Green Initiative runway show, and Koffman judged it a success because an overflow crowd of more than 400 people attended the event, held at Smashbox’s Stage One theater, which typically seats 248 people, according to Koffman.
The show cost over $50,000 to produce and featured the work of Rene Geneva Design, Peligrosa and Wet Cement.
While she did not break even, Koffman was bullish enough on the environmental movement’s burgeoning fashion scene that she wanted to do it again.
The next step for Koffman, who also is the owner of fashion showroom The Gallery Los Angeles, will be producing the Green Initiative Humanitarian Fashion Show in New York around the time of the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in New York in February 2008.
It could be a very busy period for her, because in March 2008, she plans to stage another Green Initiative show to coincide with Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in Culver City.
But Koffman because she might not stage the show at Smashbox and said she might need a bigger venue.
Arts organizations EcoNouveau and BoxEight co-produced a show of eco-fashion on Oct. 13 at the former Catholic church St. Vibiana’s. While they were confident in the future of eco-fashion, they had no plans to work with each other for upcoming fashion weeks, according to BoxEight executives and EcoNouveau co-producer Sarah Shewey.
At EcoNouveau and BoxEight’s show, London-based Gary Harvey Creative showed ball gowns made out of discarded items including newspapers. Brooklyn, N.Y.–based Bahar Shahpar and Los Angeles– based Avita showed contemporary fashions constructed out of sustainable materials such as organic cotton and bamboo.
More than an estimated 1,700 people visited the EcoNouveau-BoxEight event on Oct. 13. The six-hour concert, art and fashion party featured entertainment including DJs and a dance troupe. It cost an estimated $150,000 to produce, according to Hillary Coe, the group’s executive director.
While BoxEight plans to build another fashion event next March to coincide with Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week, there might not be a specific eco-fashion event in the lineup, according to Coe. She said that the group did not want to pigeonhole itself as an environmental organization, even though it worked to limit waste generated by the event by using bio-diesel generators for energy needs, not gas generators, which reportedly produce more carbon emissions.
Both Coe and BoxEight founder and President Peter Gurnz confirmed that they will include eco-fashions in their upcoming events, but they did not know if it was wise to place these styles in a green ghetto.
“To feature just a single night for eco-fashions is not an answer,” Gurnz said. “We’d like all designers to take a look at how they do things.”
Green will be a continuing obsession with Mercedes- Benz Fashion Week producer IMG. The New York–based organization will co-produce a Nov. 22 event devoted to sustainable fashion called ecoStyle FutureFashion in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Eco-fashion items will be presented from Oscar de la Renta, Diane von Furstenberg, Proenza Schouler, Rebecca Taylor, Karen Walker, Halston, Derek Lam, Heatherette, Daryl K, Habitual, Project Alabama, United Bamboo and Imitation of Christ.
IMG also consulted with an environmental business, The CarbonNeutral Company, to measure and ultimately find ways to limit waste and carbon emissions generated by Los Angeles Fashion Week. Carbon Neutral representative Cate Muller said that the London-headquartered firm would not finish tallying up the week’s waste until Nov. 2. There were also no current plans to consult IMG at the upcoming fashion weeks.
But if Carbon Neutral’s past experience can be judged, the week’s carbon emissions could pack a punch. The group also did work with the Council of Fashion Designers of America’s annual CFDA Fashion Awards gala on June 4. The airplane and car travel to the event, as well as the production of the awards show, cost 16.4 metric tons of carbon emissions, according to Muller.—Andrew Asch
