Interviews

Little Yellow Bird, a company based in New Zealand that produces ethical and sustainable workwear and basics, recently raised $1.2 million to develop a technology platform which will verify the origins of apparel in the garment industry in a quest to end modern-day slavery. The tech platform, called Origins, will use NEM blockchain technology to trace garments from origin to sale. Founder-CEO Samantha Jones became the first woman globally to have a project funded via the NEM community fund...

Luxury as Ethics Designer: Amilani Perera Launched: 2013 Website: amilaniperera.com With a doctor as mother and an engineer as father, for Amilani Perera fashion almost didn't happen. The parents gave in to the daughter's flair and passion to paint and draw, but not before she had studied statistics and economics. Yet, even after she had done fashion design from Singapore's Lasalle College, Amilani's parents were wary about her jumping into the industry straight away and launching her own brand...

The Clean Fibre Initiative was created by Earth Alive Clean Technologies to support fibre crop growers in North America, Africa, and Latin America. What was the reason for focusing on these three regions, and leaving out Asia? Earth Alive currently has operations in North America, Africa and Latin America and our established business network in these regions facilitated the development of the Clean Fibre Initiative. Our company intends to expand into the Asian market, bringing the Clean Fibre...

The innerwear/intimate wear sector has changed drastically over the last one decade. What factors according to have contributed to this? Karan Behal: Over the past decade, the average woman in India has gained exposure from social media, the ways of the West and similar sources. This has led innerwear and intimatewear to no longer remaining a hush-hush discussion, but rather one wherein women openly have a say in their choice and preferences. Women no longer accept lingerie as casual innerwear...

Is digital textile printing defining the industry today? Be it 'yes' or 'no', could you explain your assessment? Why is it so? Kamal Kulshreshth: No, the textiles industry is too huge to be defined by digital printing. Printing is only one way of adding value to fabric. Besides printing, fabrics are dyed, jacquard patterned, dobby patterned or imparted special finishes to add value. Even within the printed variety, less than 5 per cent of the total printed fabric production is digital, but...

What, according to you, has been the growth story of the FESPA Global Print Expo since it was organised for the first time? On that count, could you also share some numbers in terms of participants, visitors, etc? Roz Guarnori: FESPA has certainly come a long way since the launch of its first exhibition in Paris in 1963. Originally formed as an exhibition for European screen printers, by 1973 the event started to grow its audience outside Europe, welcoming visitors from further afield including...

How do you look at your brand's growth since your launch? Has it been according to (i) your expectations, and (ii) your own plans? Roshan Baid: To be honest, the growth of Alcis Sports has surpassed all expectations. I am very happy with the way Alcis Sports has been received by the audiences. We are currently selling over 30,000 items every month through various channels of sales. In the first year of our inception, we had revenue of about ₹6 crore and by the end of the financial year 2017–18...

Cotton Council International (CCI), the export promotion arm of the National Cotton Council of America (NCC), is a non-profit trade association that promotes US cotton fibre and manufactured cotton products around the globe with the Cotton USA trademark. CCI has 60 years of experience promoting US cotton fibre and products to trade and consumers, and works with spinning mills, fabric and garment manufacturers, brands, retailers, textile associations, governments and the USDA to facilitate the...

How concerned are you about copyright over your creations and the problem of piracy? Shilpa Agarwalla: We are very much concerned about the issue of copyright and IPR at large. While as a business, we own overall trademark as well copyright for our creations, I am appalled at the blatant imitations by many players in the fashion industry. I would not like to quote any specific instance, but if you look up the web for our designs as well as those of any leading designers, you will find copycats...

On current challenges Every industry needs three key components that give it the impetus of evolving into a significant and organised contributor to the economy, namely (i) education / R&D / skill training, (ii) association, (iii) government regulation / empowerment. The Indian fashion industry (albeit the status is more of a sub-sector of textiles) is relatively young from an organised perspective considering that its pioneering educational institutions and associations are less than three...