Photos: Roshni Khatri
Fast fashion is a major contributor to climate change, and the fashion industry is one of the largest polluters in the world. Sustainable fashion focuses on environmentally friendly practices, on using eco-friendly materials, reducing waste, and promoting fair labor practices and, by focusing on these aspects, the sustainable fashion movement seeks to mitigate the negative impacts of traditional fashion practices and promote a more responsible and ethical approach to clothing production and consumption.
In the aftermath of the High-Level week at the United Nations with events, discussions, and expert talks on the global state of sustainable fashion, 1014 hosted a Salon-style evening, curated by Claudia Mahler, to continue this discussion with a round of diverse experts and practitioners: American fashion designer Angel Chang; German-American founders of Celsious Sustainable Laundry Service Theresa and Corinna Williams; Ann Cantrell, Associate Professor at Fashion Institute for Technology for Sustainability; and Evie Evangelou, President and Founder of Fashion 4 Development (F4D).
Biographies
Angel Chang is an American womenswear designer who has been working with ethnic minority artisans in southwest rural China for the last eight years. She began her career designing for Donna Karan Collection in New York and Chloé (See by Chloé) in Paris.
As a TED Resident and Smithsonian Artist, Angel now speaks to global audiences about fashion, sustainability, and indigenous knowledge. As a NEST Professional Fellow and Member of the Artisan Alliance, she provides design expertise to artisan groups around the world. She has been featured in American publications The New York Times, VOGUE, ELLE, W, Women’s Wear Daily, PAPER, and foreign publications VOGUE China, L’Officiel, Jalouse, Madame Figaro, Die Welt, South China Morning Post. Her has been collected by The Museum at FIT and the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center. She received an MA in Modern Art from Columbia University, and BA cum laude in Art History & Visual Arts from Barnard College in New York City.
Ann Cantrell is both an entrepreneur and an academic. She owns a modern general store in Brooklyn, NY for the past seventeen years (Annie’s Blue Ribbon General Store in Park Slope) and also teaches full time in the Fashion Business Management Department at the Fashion Institute of Technology for the past 14 years. Between her shop and her work at FIT, she has been interviewed & quoted in several worldwide publications including The New York Times, USA Today, Forbes, BBC World News, NBC News, MSNBC, ABC Nightly News, Associated Press and more. She has her MBA with a concentration in Sustainability and is a big proponent of the triple bottom line in all facets of business. Ann received the Changemaker Award at FIT last year for her contributions to sustainability on campus.
Photo: Bogdana Ferguson
Celsious is NYC's premium sustainable laundry service and online destination for eco-friendly garment care solutions. Celsious was founded in 2017 by Corinna and Theresa Williams, two sisters who dared to reimagine the laundry experience in NYC. They have made it their mission to deliver a “cleaner clean" meaning laundry that looks and feels better than ever, achieved without the use of harmful ingredients.
Celsious has washed millions of pounds of laundry with a unique line of non-toxic garment care products at their modern facility in Brooklyn. Their customers have been so impressed by the results that naturally, they wanted to make their products available to everyone. Now anyone can do laundry the Celsious way—with mineral- and plant-based laundry powder, color-safe oxygen brightener and their small but mighty stain removing soap stick.
Evie Evangelou is the President and Founder of Fashion 4 Development (F4D) and Founding partner of Sustainia Living. She first introduced F4D’s global awareness campaign and the First Ladies Luncheon initiative in 2011, inspired by her career in the international arena of cultural diplomacy and international relations, specializing in Entertainment, Arts, Fashion, Beauty, Travel and Tourism, and Trade Development. Previously, Evie served as interim Deputy Secretary General for the World Federation of the United Nations in NYC, where she worked with more than 100 UN Member States and Countries and Missions, as well as numerous non-governmental bodies focused on education, cultural affairs and humanitarian causes. She received the appointment by Kensaku Hogen, a former Under Secretary General of the United Nations Department of Public Information, as a Special Consultant for Cultural and Educational Affairs and programs within UNDPI, one of the nine departments comprising the United Nations Secretariat. She was also appointed as a strategic consultant to the special representative of the UN Secretary-General for the United Nations themes “Dialogue among Civilizations and Diversity is Beautiful”. Throughout her career she has received acknowledgements by the U.S. Senate and honored by several international governments as well as served as Goodwill Ambassador. In 2013, Fashion Group International presented Evie Evangelou with the Humanitarian Award for her work of creating positive social change for humanity.
Claudia Mahler is a Salon host, podcaster, and creative activist, with more than a decade of experience curating meaningful conversations for women in business, art, and education in Europe and the United States. Her approach to event curation for organizations and businesses is more philosophical than presentational, so her women’s events are participatory, inspiring, and offer a desired break from routine. As a seasoned Communications and PR professional, having worked globally with clients in the consumer and luxury brands field, she has built a large network and international community.