It’s fashion week here in the Big Apple. Last weekend I was invited by a friend to attend the fashion show of a designer named Abi Ferrin. Setting aside any worries about the woeful inadequacy of my own wardrobe, I braced myself for a world of lavishness, inanity, excess, and vicious competitiveness. It was going to be entertaining.
My expectations were met beginning at the velvet rope. Once we were ushered inside, the space opened up to reveal a world of lights, catwalks, models, and the obligatory pumping music. Photographers were rushing to photograph the famous, powerful, and gossip-worthy. It was every bit as superficial and frivolous as I had anticipated.
Once settled in my seat a row from the catwalk, my attention turned toward the video playing on the backsplash of the catwalk. A giant close-up of a frog walking up a branch in his rainforest habitat. Next, pictures of waterfalls, and busy insects scurrying along the forest floor. I began to question my assumptions.
As we learned in a film preceding the show, Abi Ferrin had become a supporter of the Rainforest Recovery Initiative, a group of private citizens buying primary rainforest in Costa Rica for preservation. Her involvement didn’t end there. Abi had spent time with local women and enlisted them to help make part of the collection we were about to see. The clothing themselves were clearly inspired by the lush forests and fauna of the Amazon, with accessories that added a rustic touch.
In addition, Ms. Ferrin supports the Freedom Project which rescues women from oppressive environments such as human trafficking and extreme poverty, and trains and eventually employs them to be come manufacturers for Abi Ferrin’s collection. Ms. Ferrin states that the Freedom Project is “core to the Abi Ferrin’s brand.” In fact, Abi Ferrin’s motto is “Fashion with Freedom and Purpose.”
Is this a cynical exploitation of the current trend toward eco-fashion? I was convinced that it is not. Is this indicative that the current trend toward sustainable fashion is extending to the high fashion world? I don’t know. But Abi Ferrin’s star as a successful designer is on the rise, and she is taking her social and environmental concerns to the catwalk and the department store. I would be on the lookout for other emerging fashion labels to follow in her steps.