FELDER FELDER INC

Continuing on the topic of seaweed, DANIELA FELDER and I want to highlight the incredible properties that nature and indeed seaweed have to offer and the innovators who are accessing these properties to offer a variety of solutions for the fashion and textiles sector. Having created a design for our Ecouture line out of seaweed with a material from Carbonwave (currently on view at the FSU Museum of Fine Arts, Tallahassee, FL), we were curious when Patrick Michel, co-founder of Soarce approached us last year about the developments of their seaweed derived materials. After initial calls with their energetic and mission driven team and viewing of their seaweed material samples, which included some beautiful semi sheer swatches, that also felt great to touch - we decided on getting together for our Future Fashion Concepts Exhibition, the educational initiative of Felder Felder, which took place at ISTITUTO MARANGONI MIAMI earlier this year. Soarce exhibited their solutions and materials and co- founder Mason Mincey participated in the panel discussion that we organized as part of the opening, where he elaborated on the challenges that the fashion industry is currently facing and solutions that he and his team are creating to overcome these challenges from natural, renewable sources such as seaweed. ‘There is over 30 plus restricted toxins that go on our clothing (today). What we are trying to do is to eliminate all these separate treatments for fire, for resistance, for UV and to get it all in one shot without using any petrochemicals, any restricted substances on the list, so brands don’t have to compromise.’ With increasing attention and consumer awareness on toxins in our clothes, we are thrilled for their innovations to be utilized by fashion brands across all sectors for toxic free alternatives. With Future Fashion Concepts, we are striving to empower the next generation of designers to find out about and experience alternatives like Soarce for a more responsible fashion industry- one that leaves petrochemicals in the ground, regenerates earth and restores oceans, while respecting all living beings. Images FFC: Bryan Deimer Image Ecouture:Brix and Maas Model : Aglaja Brix H&M: Sam Hill Ecouture Design by FELDER FELDER INC Special thanks to Sofía Agostini #responsiblefashion #sustainablefashion #biomaterials #greenchemistry #sdgs #UnitedNations

Do you ask yourself the question ‘What is in my clothes?’ It is one of fashion’s skills to mystify who and what has created a beautiful blouse, a dreamy dress or a sharp suit. The power of fashion marketing has utilized images and words that create aloof associations that have disconnected not only consumers but also creatives from asking these questions. Think: ‘ this material is soft, shiny, subtle’ instead of asking ‘which processes have created this softness, shine or subtleness’ With increased scrutiny on social justice with regards to garment labor (rightly so) , social movements like Fashion Revolution and their amazing founders Orsola de Castro and Carry Somers have brought public attention to the question ‘Who Made My Clothes’. Now Fashion Revolution has just published a report called ‘What Fuels Fashion’, bringing attention to the heavy carbon emission of fashion supply chains as well as to the industry’s reliance on synthetic fibers, which are made from petrochemicals, a byproduct of fossil fuels. (https://lnkd.in/gEgRDDbQ) It is an unpleasant thought, that my workout gear (worn right on my skin- like every day) originated from crude oil. Yikes! The wonderful Livia Giuggioli Firth, Indigo Jones and George Harding-Rolls had already brought our attention to this topic with the Fossil Fuel Fashion Campaign, shedding light on hard to fathom information like ‘Synthetic fibre production uses the equivalent amount of oil per year as the entirety of Spain’. (https://lnkd.in/gkV4he6r) DANIELA FELDER then had the honor to be invited to the European Parliament, where Livia moderated the panel discussion, Fashionscapes of Transformation, which seeked ‘to explore the role of policy measures in reducing the fashion sector’s reliance on plastic fibres (…) and in creating a flourishing fashion industry which operates within planetary boundaries.’ How toxic some of our fashion can be in order to provide some of textile’s desired properties has also been documented in Alden Wicker ‘s book ‘To Dye For’ which honestly reads like a fashion thriller, just it is reality. In our Future Fashion Concepts (FFC) Initiative, we are highlighting some of the incredible innovators that are working on changing this reality by offering natural solutions for textile enhancing properties. At our last edition of FFC at ISTITUTO MARANGONI MIAMI , Mason Mincey of Soarce explained how they are utilizing seaweed to create additives for color fastening and fire resistance. The solutions are there, now there needs to be 1. the will 2. the scale to make fashion not just beautiful on the outside but on the ‘inside’, too. Please share your experience or reactions that you have had to your wardrobe’s ingredients.

Today, we want to share our experience on working with the plant- based, plastic-free leather alternative Made with Mirum by NFW in 2019 before it was officially launched in 2021, and some of the things we have learned along the way: 1. It’s a collaborative effort between designer, material innovator & production. 2. The importance of developing a flexible approach. 3. The importance of having realistic expectations: Understanding at which stage the material is and embracing those boundaries. We were extremely lucky that Tara St James introduced us to #NFW at a very early stage of their development, allowing us to collaborate with them in a truly creative way. With FF, we became well-known for our Rock N Roll aesthetic using a lot of metallics in our collections, and we really struggled to find cruelty-free and plastic-free alternatives, when we made the move into sustainability in 2014. Naturally, when we started the conversation with NFW, we instantly wanted to know if we can create metallic colors, ideally in gold marble hues. Challenge accepted, they went back into the lab & started creating samples, using a blend of natural rubber, plant-based oils, waxes, pigments, and various natural fillers like coconut fibers and mineral based golden pigments for our wished shade and indeed NFW managed to create a look we truly loved in a surprisingly short amount of time. With the focus on the design process, we had to test and see how this new material behaves- Mirum was beautiful and after some experimentation we were able to create a gown with big draped pleats that were just tuck-stitched in the waist. It was a completely different design to the original sketch, but this was part of the process of working with next-gen innovations that were not on the market yet. Speculative design so to say. NFW have been able to adjust and to create scalable and commercial products in just a few years, from leather alternatives for apparel, plastic free rubber soles to vegan car seats for BMWi When we worked with Mirum, we had realistic expectations & our objective was to showcase “Future Fashion Concepts” at the Inauguration of LFW ’s official "Positive Fashion" Exhibition, a place for visitors to discover and explore the compelling stories of how the fashion industry can be a force for change. For the next generation of designers, there will be so many more possibilities in the world of responsible & cruelty-free innovations, but some of the challenges may remain the same, especially when designing with cutting edge innovations. Therefore, we encourage young designers to be bold, to be creative & most importantly to be open-minded. Remember, the three golden rules for exploring next-gen materials: 1. Collaboration 2.Flexibility 3. Realistic expectations. And the world is your (vegan) oyster. Have you ever worked with next-gen materials? We would love to hear your experiences / recommendations in the comments.

DANIELA FELDER and I are so excited that Felder Felder is now a member of the United Nations Fashion and Lifestyle Network with our Future Fashion Concepts Initiative. It has been quite a journey to get to the conception of Future Fashion Concepts- from graduating from Central Saint Martins, launching Felder Felder out of college to being part of British Fashion Council and to the incredible thrill of doing catwalk shows at London Fashion Week (with epic soundtracks by Arthur Baker ). From there, we experienced our personal turning point, while watching the documentary The True Cost over ten years ago, realizing that we were not only contributing to Fashion’s creativity and rebellion, which we so aspired to do but also to the pollution and waste that our industry created. Full Stop. I guess this is the moment many people would call “the Shift Moment.” But just walking away from fashion and leaving behind what had been such a big part of our lives, identities and self expression did not feel right to us. What did seem right to us though was to move away from being part of the problem and instead striving to find ways to be part of solutions for an alternate creative industry. Daniela and I started to seek out designers, creatives and entrepreneurs that put people and planet first in their creations and companies. We were lucky to meet and be guided by such pioneers as Nina Marenzi and Tara St James With Daniela and I deeply caring about to the connectedness between designs and the use of nature’s resources as well as understanding the need for #degrowth (aligned with United Nations SDG 12 “Responsible Consumption and Production” ), we decided against seasonal collections and instead started creating bespokely made designs, from Next Gen material innovations, which we called Ecouture, which has led to incredible partnerships from BMWi to Dr Hauschka/ WALA and ECOALF The next iteration of our journey came when we started lecturing at fashion schools, which offered an opportunity to utilize creativity to engage the next generation of designers in the world of responsible fashion and design processes. This is when it clicked and we extended Future Fashion Concepts (which we initially launched during Art Basel Miami with established designers) to an educational setting by bringing together students and material innovators through experiencing the process of designing, making and then exhibiting their creations made from solution driven materials in a high fashion exhibition- which immerses all participants into the possibilities of an alternate fashion ecosystem. Just like nature, our journey has not been linear and sometimes the path really starts to unfold while walking it. For that matter, we are excited about the next edition of Future Fashion Concepts as part of the United Nations Fashion and Lifestyle Network. __________________ #sustaianblefashion #SDG #responsiblefashion #nature #ecouture

DANIELA FELDER and I are beyond honored that Felder Felder is now a proud member of the United Nations Fashion and Lifestyle Network with our Future Fashion Concepts initiative, bringing together creativity, innovation and responsible business and design practices with educational fashion institutions. The United Nations Fashion and Lifestyle Network plays a key role in advancing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by connecting industry stakeholders, media, governments, and UN entities. The UN Fashion and Lifestyle Network, led by the UN Office for Partnerships and the Fashion Impact Fund, advocates for transparent, inclusive engagement, fostering collaboration and innovation. Learn more about our commitment to drive change: unfashionlifestyle.org#SDGFashion #UNFLNetwork Huge thanks to Valentina Marschik and Megan McAstocker for their continuous guidance and thank you to Kerry Bannigan for bringing us all together. Thank you also to Mary Gehlhar for her support and to Sirena del Mar Andras for sharing her knowledge. #sdgs #fashion

Get together with purpose! Thanks so much to PVBLIC Foundation and Fashion Impact Fund for hosting a get together in Miami, bringing together Innovators, Creatives, Educators and Industry for their Earth Month reception. My takeaway truly was that stakeholders are ready for a collaborative strive towards accountable steps to advance SDGs across our respective industries. Yes, also in Miami !-) Connecting with like minded communities for a bigger purpose has completely and entirely changed my perspective of living here, installing not just a sense of belonging but also of cari?o for the city that I now (finally) call home. Shout out to the lovely Patrick Duffy for getting us together and also to Mary Gehlhar for the intro to Kerry Bannigan and Megan McAstocker - dream team. And great seeing and meeting old and new friends. #sdg #miami #responsiblebusiness #climateweekmiami #fashionimpactfund ISTITUTO MARANGONI MIAMI

“Invest in the journey (…)” Katherine Reeder , Ecovative - the mycelium technology company __________________________________________ Why is it so hard to get your hands on Mycelium Materials? DANIELA FELDER asked Kat at our Future Fashion Concepts Panel ISTITUTO MARANGONI MIAMI In this video, Kat explains why it is still a challenge to get your hands on textiles made with the root structure of mushrooms, called Mycelium, and how at Ecovative - the mycelium technology company they decide with which designer/brand to work with. Personally being obsessed with the World of Fungi and all it has to offer, we were determined to work with biomaterials created with Mycelium for our Ecouture line. It was much harder than expected, a lot of the companies we approached had exclusives and could not commit to a new brand and others were still in the beginning stages of development. In 2018, when we inaugurated the first Future Fashion Concepts Exhibition during Art Basel Miami, our dear friend Paloma Teppa, the incredible biophilia artist of Plant the Future connected us with Ecovative, as we were planning to do a collaborative piece with her and we decided that mycelium was our preferred choice of material. At the time, Ecovative did not even offer hides, so we convinced them to allow us to work with the foams that were really just meant to be used for insulation purposes. As we created an art piece that was not intended to be worn, they provided us with the Mycelium foam and we created a Mycelium Coat, beautifully hand embroidered with Paloma’s preserved mushrooms and moss. Since then, we have been on a mission to work with the vegan “leather” like hides, that Ecovative - the mycelium technology company were in the process of developing under the Forager branch of the business. Last summer at the #futurefabricsexpo in London, we met up with Andy Bass and Lacey Davidson of Ecovative to finally get the good news (after 5! years): Felder Felder would be the next brand to work with the Mycelium hides. We were connected to a nearby tannery where the hides are getting finished, in this case ECCO Leather B.V. and the absolutely wonderful Teo Pazanin and we discussed which look we wanted to achieve and decided on the best option together. We finally created our Mycelium Unisex Design exclusively for the Future Fashion Exhibition at ISTITUTO MARANGONI MIAMI in collaboration with the Head of Fashion Design Mario Braghieri and it is hard to understand how much patience, collaborative effort and persistence is behind this one design, so I took the opportunity to ask Ecovative’s Kat Reeder on our panel why it is such a long process and how they choose on the designers to work with. Thank you to everyone who made this happen.

Thanks ISTITUTO MARANGONI MIAMI for featuring Future Fashion Concepts on its blog (written by my wonderful student Marcela Barbosa- thank you!). My sister DANIELA FELDER and I feel blessed to be part of a like minded fashion community, exploring exchange of perspectives as well as creativity to communicate alternate ways to the traditional fashion system. With this in mind, beyond Istituto Marangoni Miami hosting our exhibition in their beautiful space, it was a true pleasure to collaborate with IMM’s Program Leader for Fashion Design, Mario Braghieri to develop a design for our Ecouture Collection made with mycelium from one of our exhibitors Forager by Ecovative - the mycelium technology company In our experience, the collaborative aspect truly elevates when there is a mutual understanding that the design is not just about the latest look, yet the potential of what the Future of Fashion might be made of. In this case, Forager’s mycelium was grown on agricultural waste- literally grown into the material that is used for our collaborative design as well as a stunning handbag that Forager presents at our exhibition. Mario and we decided to leave the design as “raw” as possible, forgoing lining or edge dye to embrace the roots of the material, transforming it into a unisex vest, embodying elegant simplicity. Thank you to all that made this experience happen, from growing the Forager Hydes for our collaboration - shout out to Lacey Davidson and to Katherine Reeder for coming to Miami to speak at the exhibition’s panel. At ISTITUTO MARANGONI MIAMI thank you to Mario Braghieri , Sofía Agostini ,Aleja Madrid , Nathalie Tessier as well as our incredible students and of course Hakan Baykam for bringing creativity and innovation to Miami. https://lnkd.in/eEJ5TW2W