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Sustainability of fashion is – judging from the relatively broad consensus of opinions I’ve been acquainted with over the last few months – closely linked to ‘Slow Fashion’.
Slow Fashion in this context can mean a number of things:
– Buying clothes that are quality products that will last if not a life time, then at least a decade or so.
– Buying clothes that are not just the hype of the season, but as individual pieces timeless. Their combination with other items of clothing is an expression of style – even the style of the season.
– Learning basic mending skills that make clothes, once bought, last longer. Examples are: sewing on buttons, mending a seam or a fringe, shortening trousers.
Key to all these aspects is, at the bottom line, the appreciation and knowledge of how much effort actually goes in the making of a single piece of garment.
The skill to be able and make your own garment, if even one chooses in the end not to, is something that most of us have never learned. Which simply means, we probably have not much of a notion of what ‘making a dress’ actually means. Creating your pattern? Cutting the pattern? Basic operation of a sewing machine? Well, … Whether Paris, London, Tokyo, New York or Buenos Aires – the current state of affairs as for actual sewing knowledge is probably similar in much of the developed world.
Paris however, is an interesting phenomenon in many ways. I’ve not seen so many shops in my life lined up side by side, selling fabrics in all types of colours, materials, patterns, makes as in Montmartre. Well, maybe with exception of Delhi or Bombay. And prices aside [which are still ways too cheap], neither have I seen so many simple (‘understatement’), yet great cuts and high quality clothing sold in small shops. Paris it feels to me, may come second to London commercially in the fashion world, but style wise, there is no doubt that the French win the match.
A proof of the French love for ‘couture’, as well as for that – maybe – DIY fashion is experiencing a revival, is an extraordinary shop located only a few stops south of the Eurostar’s Gare du Nord: Sweat Shop Paris Café Couture.
The concept of the shop couldn’t be neither more compelling nor simpler:
>Imagine an internet cafe.
>Exchange the computers for singer sewing machines.
>Add large front windows, a few racks of coloured thread and knitting wool.
>Add a real espresso machine, and well as a number of organic soft drinks in house, and a small restaurant next door.
>Have it all run and overseen by 2 fashion designers that used to run their own label, and have many years of experience in designing as well as making their own clothes.
>Add courses in the evenings and on weekends, that cover the basics of sewing, knitting and crochet, and a few more on recycling fabrics and advanced dress making.
That’s what Sweat Shop Paris Café Couture – in brief – is all about.
At 6 Euro an hour, basic advice included, the place is ideal for people that either don’t have the space for their own sewing machine, or else, feel they need some support to safely navigate the cliffs of fringes, seams, button holes and size adjustments.
Conclusion: Great idea, that touches the nerve of our time. Definitely a must visit when you’re in Paris.
Sidenote: The shop owners, Martina Duss and Sissi Holleis, are toying with the idea to expand their business and add another shop. You know someone in London that would be interested, has the skills – designer with hands-on experience – and the motivation to add a real novelty to the city of Somerset House Fashion Weeks?
Tomorrow: Paris Ethical Fashion Show September 2010: D1 – Défilé means catwalk
Previous: London Fashion Week September 2010: Summary – Sustainability & Fashion: Lessons learned
