From the catwalks in New York and Paris to school auditoriums everywhere, a new fashion phenomenon is taking hold. Call it what you like – eco-fashion, recycled fashion, ethical fashion – it’s all about designing clothing that succeeds at recycling materials, conserving water, protecting endangered animal species, and more. And now the eco-craze is taking hold everywhere else, like in home, furniture and jewelry design. It’s a green, green, green, green life!
What can you do with an old bathing suit? A group of British students working with fashion firm From Somewhere recycled Speedo suits into this sleek evening gown. As reported by the website Ecouterre, the gown bears the colors of several nations, including the US, Great Britain and Israel. The goal of the designers was to create a “unity” gown, as in a gown that unified all nations. Watch this video to learn more about how they did it:
The next time you throw your dirty clothes in the washing machine, think about this:
Soon there may be a liquid laundry additive that coats your shirts and dresses with nano-particles of the metal titanium dioxide. Exposing your treated clothing to sunlight will cause a chemical reaction that results in harmful airborne pollutants known as nitrogen oxides literally being pulled out of the air, latching onto your clothes.
After “eating” the pollution, your clothing will “digest” it, by which we mean that the nitrogen oxides will be converted into harmless, odorless chemicals that can be easily and safely washed away the next time you load up the washing machine.
Nitrogen oxides aren’t the only source of air pollution, but they are a big one. Nitrogen dioxide is the gas that spews into the air largely from power plants and the tailpipes on our cars and trucks. Other nitrogen oxides lead to the formation of ozone and acid rain. Long story short: nitrogen oxides are bad stuff. They make it more difficult to breathe. They’re a key reason why asthma among children (whose lungs aren’t yet fully developed) is skyrocketing in urban and industrial areas of the world.
Fashion designers and scientists have been experimenting with pollution-eating clothing for some time, especially in Great Britain. Now, the London College of Fashion and the University of Sheffield are ready to unveil what the website Phys.org calls a “revolutionary liquid laundry additive” that will coat clothing with nano-particles of titanium dioxide. The additive is called “CatClo.” Reportedly, it needs to be applied only once. Ecover, a Belgium company that specializes in ecological cleaning products, is expected to bring CatClo to market.
Here’s the payoff: A person wearing CatClo-treated clothing reportedly will be able to “eat” as much nitrogen oxide each day as produced by a typical family car. At the very least, then, it sounds as if CatClo (and similar products that surely will follow) could put a lid on the world’s rapidly-growing air pollution problem, thereby saving and extending a lot of lives.
Don’t get too excited just yet. As a number of scientists have pointed out, it remains to be seen whether people will accept that wearing titanium dioxide-treated clothing doesn’t pose any risk to their own health. In addition, environmentalists will need to satisfied that water used to wash nitrogen oxides out of clothing doesn’t pose a threat to the environment.
Would sit in a chair made from recycled cardboard? Would sleep on a recycled cardboard bed? It may sound uncomfortable but this video might just get you to change your mind.
Recently Earth Preservers told you about comfy-looking chairs and beds actually made from recycled cardboard.
Continuing our theme of recycled furniture, here’s a deck chair made from recycled rubber tires. It actually looks really comfortable, don’t you think?
The last time Earth Preservers looked at recycled fashions Hollywood-style, we featured designer Jeff Garner, whose clients reportedly include Miley Cyrus, Cameron Diaz and Sheryl Crow.
But while Garner’s dresses look pretty typical, the recycled fashions of our latest featured designer, Gary Harvey, are anything but/
Wouldn’t it be great if Miley Cyrus or some other famous actress walked the red carpet on Oscar night wearing a dress made out of old newspapers?
We’ve got the perfect dress, as you’ll see about one minute into this video.
Eco Fashion & Design, 
