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Follow us on Twitter or befriend us on Facebook FASHION DILEMMACan fashion be a force for good? It won't last long and we will soon, no doubt, be back to choking on our cornflakes over dubiously dressed celebrities and marvelling at the wonder that is Karl Lagerfeld's Twitter timeline, but this week Fashion Statement isn't feeling particularly flippant. In fact, we've decided to dedicate this week's dose of frivolity to the ways in which fashion isn't really that bad at all. Here, then, are 10 small ways in which you can make a difference and still get the thrill of retail therapy. The type you pay for, rather than the type that involves bricks through shop windows ... 1. Make a bid in a charity auction Beauty company Shiseido has launched an auction to help raise money for the British Red Cross, to assist the victims of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. All funds will go directly to help provide healthcare, food and water to the many thousands of homeless and displaced people. Pampering prizes include spa breaks, hotel stays, shopping sprees, iPods and more. Bid at ebay.co.uk/auctionforjapan . 2. Visit your high street Londoners: go and visit the new Give + Take shop on Lordship Lane, East Dulwich. You can sell or donate your unwanted goods in their part-exchange programme and get some lovely new things to take home too. Or find your nearest TRAID shop (several have been damaged in the recent riots) and support their work by grabbing yourself a vintage bargain or a fabulous TRAIDremade piece. And if you are gnashing your teeth at FS's London-centricity, you can also buy their things online at traidremade.com. 3. Think little FS may write debatably amusing pieces about hideous overpriced baby ranges, but we do not encourage you to buy them. Instead, buy less and buy ethical. Feel free to label us as middle-aged, stuck-up hypocrites, but we prefer our kids clothes not to actually be made by kids. Some of our favourites: Green Baby, Frugi, Babipur, Little Green Radicals and Seasalt. We particularly love Frugi's new welly boots, coming soon to a muddy puddle near you. 4. Stay in, go shopping There are a huge number of brilliant ethical fashion sites online, from high fashion boutiques such as fashion-conscience.com and ethical pioneers such as People Tree, to our new favourite, Grannies Inc (like the Shreddies ad, only REAL). If you have no idea where to even begin, try browsing our rather-fabulous-even-though-we-say-it-ourselves ethical fashion directory. 5. Vote The Future Friendly Awards celebrate great local environmental efforts around the UK. Have a browse and vote for your favourites: FS is voting for the O3 Ethical Fashion Fest at Oxford fashion week. 6. Step out FS suspects trainers are having a bit of an image crisis, though possibly in a marketing meeting right now someone is claiming, "But our brand were voted most lootable! That's GREAT!". Buy some ethically produced ones: more expensive than a broken shop window, but with fewer unpleasant side effects (court cases and the like). Our suggestions: Terra Plana, Simple Shoes and Veja. More suggestions can be found here. 7. Make your own Are you increasingly of the opinion that not only is capitalism a bad idea, but (with apologies to Douglas Adams) so was coming down from the trees and evolving in the first place? Put that cynicism away and make something nice. Our Making Time series has lots of craft projects to keep you occupied, including necklaces, snoods and dresses. 8. Check your jeans The Clean Clothes campaign is pressing fashion manufacturers and retailers to ban sandblasting, a technique used to produce 'distressed' denim. The large amounts of silica dust created can lead to silicosis, a potentially lethal pulmonary disease. Dolce & Gabanna's response? "Dolce & Gabbana telephoned me [campaiger Deborah Lucchetti] to say thanks for the information and that it did not interest them". If you, soft-hearted liberal that you are, actually are interested in stopping people dying for the sake of a pair of overpriced jeans, sign the petition here. 9. Give something back Support a charity working with marginalised young people. A recent Fashion Futures project worked with year 10 students on a product which they then had to market and present to a Dragons' Den-style panel. The winner impressed the jury with his brand Magic Sturling, named after and inspired by a friend lost to gang violence in 2008. Find out how you can support and help the charity here. 10. Give us a piece of your mind This is, of course, only a small selection of the vast number of brilliant ethical fashion projects out there. Tell us about other ones you've heard of, set up, or shopped from below, and we'll make a longer list of great projects online. FASHIONISTA OF THE WEEKNow admittedly FS is a bit upload-happy when it comes to pictures of pandas, but these ones aren't just in to provide a bit of cute animal-based distraction. Not entirely. Pandas and their obsession with bamboo are actually trendsetters, bamboo being a far more ethical fibre to use in fashion than most. Check out Rapanui Clothing for some more bamboo-based fashion (note: no pandas were starved in the making of these clothes). FASHION GRAVEYARDDolce & Gabbana, for putting the distress into distressed jeans. See number eight above. QUOTE OF THE WEEKLast night while rioting ensued on the streets of London – Tom Stubbs caused a riot of his own with editors and guests at Parlor for the launch of INC's Editor at Large campaign.
Just in case you were starting to feel all warm and fuzzy inside, proof that fashion remains as staggeringly crass as ever. This was in a press release received by the Fashionista.com blog. SHOPPING NEWSTo coincide with Wool Week, Topshop has produced three premium coats using British ethical wool produced by Izzy Lane, in-store from 5 September. Izzy Lane produces wool made from her own flocks of threatened, historic-breed sheep which have been saved from slaughter and live on her sanctuary in the Yorkshire Dales. Prices from £195. Disabled people in Kenya face a bleak future, with no healthcare, education or employment prospects. Help support the work of the Bombolulu Workshop in Mombasa, established 40 years ago to train physically disabled people in skills such as jewellery making, leatherwork and carving. People Tree has been working with the workshop for 15 years and has just launched a fabulous new jewellery collection. For every 100 pieces sold, People Tree will be donating a wheelchair. A fantastic new ethical fashion site has recently launched - browse stylewithheart.com for men's, women's and kids' clothes, shoes and accessories. It's a sort of department store/portal to hundreds of great brands, and we like it a lot. OUT AND ABOUTStudio Valbonne is hosting a night of fashion fun featuring Nancy Dee, Goodone, Fée Uhssi and Lalesso. And canapes. Let us not forget the canapes. All proceeds go to Vieux Fort Children's society, to pay for the construction of a children's home in St Lucia and the African and Caribbean Leukaemia Trust. Book tickets at joicetoday.com. For regular ethical fashion events, do check out the Ethical Fashion Forum's events calendar. OFFCUTSBrowse our comprehensive, interactive directory of ethical fashion companies here. Visit our craft pages for lots of lovely make-do-and-mend ideas. Buy Observer columnist Lucy Siegle's book on fast fashion at the Guardian Bookshop. For all the latest fashion news, visit guardian.co.uk/fashion. News to tell us? Email
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