Fair Trade, ethical, sustainable, and environmentally conscious products!

These Celebrities are changing the world for the better by opening our eyes to fair trade, ethical production, and fashion sustainability!

From the time I was teenager I looked to celebrities for the newest fashions. My mother is my role model, but I know when I was younger I wanted to be a celebrity. Who doesn’t want to make lots of money and be in the spotlight? We look at celebrities for everything from the clothes they wear to the way they cut their hair. They always seem to look flawless and eternally youthful.  

I always thought celebrities were thrown free clothing from all kinds of different fashion designer’s and this is what I looked up to. I’m sure I’m not the only one. Now that I’m more informed about where my clothing is made and the thrift shop is my best source for clothing, I wondered which celebrities are eco-friendly and are trying to make our world a better place?

Investigating the answer, I came across an article by Meghan Pustetto about eco-friendly celebrities. These icons are bringing attention to fairly traded, sustainable, and environmentally conscious products. Their status is helping many to wake up to the way our clothes are made because it seems society listens to celebrities more than someone like me!

Emma Watson

At the top of the list of celebrities promoting fair trade in the fashion industry is Emma Watson, well known for being our favorite Harry Potter heroine. For Emma, who is also a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador, promoting fair trade and ethical standards in fashion is something closely aligned with her personal values. In 2010, Watson launched her Feel Good Style site dedicated to sustainable fashion and natural beauty, and helped British fair trade brand People Tree create three collections consisting of organic and fair trade clothing. Watson also worked with luxury designer Alberta Ferretti to produce an eco range called Pure Threads back in 2011. One of the reasons Emma gives her attention to fair trade is because it gives people the opportunity to help themselves out of poverty in a sustainable way, rather than relying on charity hand-outs.

Fair Trade and ethical fashion designer Lauren Conrad

 If you don’t know who Lauren is, remember the show “The hills”. She’s also a fashion designer and author. Lauren is Co-founder of The Little Market, an online fair trade marketplace that sells handmade goods selected from artisans during her travels to countries including Bolivia, Peru, India, Nepal, Ghana and Guatemala. Through it’s work The Little Market empowers artisans all around the world to sustain their own businesses and preserve the traditional skills passed down from previous generations and to improve their communities through a commitment to ethical standards such as fair wages, fair trade and safe conditions for all workers. Lauren is no doubt garnering attention to the issue of fair trade as well as enabling these artisans to showcase their skills to a broader audience, which is in turn changing the cycle of poverty for many women and their families.

Eco-friendly Stella Mccartney

One of the most famous eco-friendly designers is Stella McCartney whose fashion house uses sustainable and environmentally friendly practices including the use of organic fabrics, renewable energy to keep the stores running, not using PVC, and joining organisations that promote ethical business practices. Stella is a lifelong vegetarian and because of this and other environmental reasons she does not use leather or fur in her designs. Stella demonstrates that the industry can adapt to make ethical, sustainable garments and that people will buy them. Stella says, “There is a vested interest because we live on this planet and we need to look after it, as without it, we have nothing. So it’s just not the fashion industry, it’s every single industry.”I think we need more people like Stella.

Eco-Friendly Rosario Dawson

Multi talented Rosario Dawson, who is my favorite actress in “Hitch” with Will Smith, is the founder of Studio 189, a company that uses fashion to implement social change and eco-friendly practices and create opportunities for empowerment, education and employment of artisans. The e-commerce site provides a platform to promote African made pieces of casual basics that have all been hand-dyed. This business model ensures the preservation of the local artisan techniques that have been passed down from previous generations and helps the women to sustain an income. Rosario says, “Our mission is symbolic. Within the brand itself, you’ll see an adinkra symbol that we use all the time. It says, “Help me and let me help you.” It is a symbol that is used throughout all of West Africa. It’s about cooperation, collaboration and interdependence. Working and helping each other is the whole basis of our line.”

Ethical fashion and Eco-friendly Olivia Wilde

Olivia Wilde is all about ethical fashion. The actress teemed up with H&M to help spread the word about their eco-friendly line. The collection used recycled polyester and organic cotton and silk and has been produced in line with company-wide fair-wage initiatives. On what sustainable fashion means to her Olivia, “It means that ethical decisions are taken at every stage of production. Garments are made from more sustainable fabrics, whether that means they are recycled from organically grown fibers or made from more sustainable materials such as tencel, which is made from the cellulose found in wood pulp. There are wider issues too, such as the rights and welfare of the workers who make the clothing and the way the garments are transported around the planet.” Wilde is also a Co-Founder of the online marketplace Conscious Commerce that proves sustainable fashion can also be stylish and she says she hopes to show that “ethical clothing isn’t a fashion fantasy but an attainable reality.”

Environmentally friendly Gwyneth Paltrow

Actress turned lifestyle guru, Gwyneth Paltrow is taking a stand for environmentally friendly fashion. Gwyneth’s company Goop has partnered up with Amour Vert to create an eco-fashion line of shirts that are made from organic fabrics, silk dyed and printed with low impact dyes. The shirts also promote sustainable practices with one tree to be planted in the Tahoe National Forest for every shirt sold. This isn’t Gwyneth’s first time advocating for sustainable fashion; the actress has also collaborated with many fashion figures including Stella McCartney and Ecoalf to produce other eco-friendly fashion lines.

These are just some of the celebrities that are taking a stance on ethical fashion. There’s more but than I’d be here all day. I love these celebrities and am happy to hear them using there celebrity status to inform people on ethical fashion. I believe these individuals are trying to make the world a better place and the more people that do that, than a change could happen down the road.