Episodes
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This week’s Episode is little different from normal. It was recorded in September at a live Q&A event at the Wheeler Centre for Books & Ideas in Melbourne, and moderated by Madeleine Morris, a reporter for ABC television’s 7.30.
We touch on a whole lot of issues front and centre in an industry currently in overdrive, from slow fashion, overconsumption and waste, to what brands are doing about supply chain transparency, as well as Australia’s move towards a Modern Slavery Act, the role of magazines in the fashion transparency conversation, and even how body mapping technology might reduce dead-stock.
For more on these issues, don't miss the shownotes here.
WHO’S TALKING?
Clare Press, yours truly, presenter of the Wardrobe Crisis podcast.
Clara Vuletich, a sustainable fashion consultant with a PhD in sustainable textiles, who has worked with clients such as H&M and Kering.
Rebecca Hard, CEO of Sussan. The Sussan Group is the Australian women’s fashion retailer that owns retail brands Sportsgirl, Sussan and Suzanne Grae.
Jessica Perrin, one of the co-founders of Not My Style, a UK-based ethical shopping app that “tells you how much your favourite fashion brands share about how they treat the women and men who make our clothes.” The app launched after a successful Kickstarter campaign last year.
Music is by Montaigne
Enjoying the show? Clare would love to hear from you - get in touch here www.clarepress.com
Please consider leaving a review in iTunes. It helps other people find us!
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We live in a our throwaway society. "Landfill fashion" has become a phrase - we literally buy clothes to throw them away. With fast fashion brands dropping new stock into store sometimes as often as every week, we're consuming new clothes like never before. The average woman wears just 40 % of what's in her wardrobe, meanwhile it's cool to declutter. Or is it? Have you considered where all that "clutter" ends up when you remove it from your house?
In this Episode, fashion model and Heart People frontwoman Rachel Rutt makes the case for making mending great again! Rachel is a mad-keen mender, weaver, knitter and sewing person. She is especially excited about patching up old denim, and wants to make that a craze - why buy pre-ripped jeans? "If you wear them enough, they will get there." Authentically aged denim is much more satisfying. By mending your clothes, you deepen your connection to them, argues Rachel.
Listen to Rachel's story of being home-schooled, shaving her head as a kid, finding herself in modelling and learning to harness the creativity within. Can fashion be a beautiful, supportive place to be? It can!
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Enjoying the show? Clare would love to hear from you - get in touch www.clarepress.com
Please consider leaving a review in iTunes. It helps other people find us!
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Missing episodes?
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It's such a treat to listen to this beautiful interview with one of Australia's most important, most innovative and most inspiraitonal fashion figures.
Linda Jackson is an iconic designer who, with her friend and creative partner Jenny Kee, invented a new language for Australian fashion in the 1970s, inspired by Australia's native flora, fauna and landscapes.
Until then, we'd mostly looked outward, copying what Europe did. But Linda and Jenny shook that whole thing up, and the world took notice. In Sydney they engergised the arts scene, bringing fashion to the party, and collaborating with creative friends like Peter Tully and David McDairmid, who went on to become leading lights of the Mardis Gras movement. In Milan and Paris, they were photographed by Italian Vogue and made a big splash. In the US, they were key to Nieman Marcus's Australian Fortnight in 1986 and in London, three years later, to the V&A show Australian Fashion: The Contemporary Art.
Linda opened her Bush Couture studio in 1982. She stepped up the art aspect to her work, she began collaborating with indigenous women batik artists at Utopia Station.
This Episode is about culture and respect, and valuing original voices. It’s also, broadly, about craft and technique and the hands-on practice of making clothes. And it's the story of how an arty kid from Melbourne grew up to be one of the wildest style voices of her generation.
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Enjoying the show? Please leave a review in iTunes. It helps other people find us.
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Stephen Jones is the most extraordinary, the most famous, and the most marvellous milliner working in fashion today.
This interview took place at the National Gallery of Victoria on the eve of the opening of the exhibition, THE HOUSE OF DIOR: SEVENTY YEARS OF HAUTE COUTURE.
During John Galliano’s tenure at Dior in particular, from 1996 to 2011, Stephen made some of the house's most jaw-droppingly fabulous hats.
Stephen also designed hats and headpieces for the designers who came after Galliano at Dior: for Raf Simons and now for Maria Grazia Chiuri. He’s collaborated with pretty much every other iconic fashion you can think of too, from Vivienne Westwood and Rei Kawakubo to Jean Paul Gaultier and Louis Vuitton. He's made hats for Lady Gaga and Rihanna, curated exhibitions of hats and written books on them.
In terms of the sustainable and ethical fashion conversation, this story is all about fashion as high art and the celebration of the hand-made. No mass production here.
But it's not just his own hats that fascinate Stephen Jones. He's a font of knowledge on the history of millinery, and its role in fashion and culture.
In this Episode, we touch on those things, and so much more. We talk the importance of Christian Dior and his New Look, and of the London club scene and the New Romantics that were so integral to forming Stephen’s taste.
And we talk about Marie Antoinette, Anna Piaggi and Princess Di, because they were all major hats fans. And you will be too after listening to this!
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. And there are some amazing pics this week. Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to check it out.
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Enjoying the show? Please leave a review in iTunes. It helps other people find us.
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Designers know they’ve made it when their collections are stocked by Saks, Bergdorf’s or Barneys. The iconic New York department stores hold a special allure, even when you live elsewhere. But retail, globally, is in a state of flux.
Will there even be physical stores in 10 or 20 years’ time? As customers continue to head online, it seems like every week there's news of another “bricks and mortar” closure. In the US, analysts predict 25 % of malls could shutter within the next five years. Will we ditch consumerism on mass, as the anti-shopping / buy nothing movements expand? Will renting fashion and clothing libraries become major trends? Or is it still all about experiences?
The latter is where Simon Doonan comes in. He calls himself a carnival type, likens his celebrated window displays for Barneys New York to something out of Coney Island – and indeed he has put some very unusual objects in shop windows in his time.
Creative director, writer, fashion commentator and OTT window dresser extraordinaire, Simon Doonan is an actual proper fashion legend.
Wait till you hear how he got into it.
Growing up gay and dreaming of glamour in 1960s Reading, he moved to Manchester then London in search of “the beautiful people”, cadging window dressing jobs off the likes Tommy Nutter (tailor to the Beatles and the Rolling Stones) and cult filmmaker Ken Russell’s wife.
Simon was a Blitz Kid (part of the famed London party set) then moved to LA, where he did windows for luxury boutique Maxfield. In mid-80s Manhattan, he worked for Diana Vreeland at the Met, before joining Barneys, where, you know, he was JUST CASUALLY FRIENDS WITH JOAN RIVERS. And nearly starred in The Devil Wears Prada.
Simon’s story is both extraordinary, and, in a weird way ordinary – in that Fashion Land has long been a place where eccentric, creative kids from small, unremarkable towns can find a home and thrive.
In this Episode we talk about his professional path, and how today’s new generation of designers and dream weavers can navigate the changed fashion landscape. We discuss Simon’s unwavering belief in the value of originality - ("Conformity is the only real fashion crime," he says) and some of the fashion geniuses he’s encountered. And of course we talk shop.
The show notes will be live shortly at www.clarepress.com/ - keep checking back, we’ll have some fantastic pics to show you.
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Enjoying the show? Please leave a review in iTunes. It helps other people find us.
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The ethical fashion movement is gathering momentum! Not so long ago sustainable, ethical, eco-fashion (whatever you want to call it) was a too easily dismissed as some way-out, niche concern. Something kooky, and very possibly hairy and hemp-y, that belonged on the lunatic fringe. Well, NO LONGER. Obvs.
Today sustainability is a buzz word. Everyone wants a piece of the activism action. We're in the middle of a Fashion Revolution, where the coolest, smartest most creative fashion fans are starting to ask more questions about who made their clothes, where how and from what.
Fabulous fashion podcaster Kestrel Jenkins is a pioneer in this space. She's been asking these questions since she was in college (she studied global studies and international journalism), became fascinated by fair trade, then went to intern at People Tree in London. Back in the her native USA she spent time in New York working for Ecouterre.
In 2016, she launched Conscious Chatter, "a podcast where what we wear matters".
Since then she's produced over 75 shows, telling stories about textiles, design, supply chains and the social and eco impacts of fashion, both fast and slow. She's interviewed everyone from True Cost filmmaker Andrew Morgan to some of the serious boss people at Patagonia (and Clare Press!).
Oh, and she's delightul.
“I always have wanted to learn the stories behind things,” says Kestrel. Her favourite word? "Curious."
In this Episode Clare and Kestrel discuss the power of the podcast as a medium, who we think is listening and why, and how we keep them tuned in.
We share our perspectives on ethical and sustainable fashion, discuss how the conversation has changed since we both first joined it, and where we see it heading.
"For all you changemakers out there" (that's a Kestrel catchphrase), it’s really a treat to hear how Kestrel built her world, and what makes her tick.
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This is our 10th episode. Can you believe it? THANK YOU for listening! We’ve covered some big ugly issues from ocean plastic to Rana Plaza so we thought it was about time we talked about beauty.
Beauty is one of the major motivators for people who work in creative industries – they want to make beautiful things, whether it’s a garment, textile, show or picture. They want, as Megan Morton puts it in this Episode, to chase down true beauty wherever they see it. Not to push the beautiful lie but to try to capture and understand it.
Megan is a stylist, author and “house whisperer” with a life-long love for vintage and the stories behind old things. She grew up on a banana farm in Queensland, where her mum subscribed to 1970s back-to-the-land magazine, Grass Roots. Megan grew up seeing the beauty in nature, while figuring out how to make stuff.
Today her styling work is focused on houses and interiors, but she turns her eye for beauty on everything from her wardrobe, to teaching to travel to Instagram. She’s worked for magazines like Vogue Living and Elle Decoration, and is the author of four books. The latest? It’s Beautiful Here (Thames & Hudson).
In this Episode we go off on a lot of beautiful tangents about managing stress in the creative industries, the heart and soul of getting dressed, the value of vintage and the importance of the handmade. We try and pin down beauty, what it means and why we seek it, and discuss the beauty of provenance, generosity and sharing.
“Being flush and doing well affects everybody in your circle and the only way to keep that going is to be generous with your knowledge. The more you give away, the more free you are.” says Megan.
Megan is also the founder of The School, a creative hub in Sydney where you can learn things like shibori dyeing and extreme knitting from the best-of-the-best craftspeople inside the industry. Hello crafternoon-inspiration.
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
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What do you think is possible? How about impossible? Kim Pearce and Katherine Davis are living proof of the old adage: where there’s a will there’s a way. The Possibility Project, which they cofounded after meeting on the school run, “delivers social justice programs through the mindset of social entrepreneurship”.
What does that look like on the ground? Try their womenswear label Slumwear 108, and made in the slums of Jaipur in partnership with the NGO i-India. The number 108, in case you’re wondering, is considered sacred in may eastern religions and traditions. Ask Kim what it means to her and she says, “It’s all about spiritual completion.”
But these clothes and accessories aren’t some mystical idea – they are real. Whether it’s a jacket made from upcycled old saris or a string of silk covered beads, they offer measureable benefits to the people who make them, and to their communities.
How do you begin to set up a social enterprise? How do you keep it going? What qualities and resources do you need? These two demonstrate that it can be as simple as giving it, as we say in Australia, a red hot go. They insist that they are two ordinary mums, but their spirit and energy is obviously EXTRAORDINARY.
In this Episode, we discuss the politics of happiness, the practicalities of rethinking what’s conventionally deemed possible and how fashion can be a fabulous way to build bridges. Listen up, and you’ll come away thinking anything is possible.
Make sure you visit clarerepress.com for the shownotes which include a bunch of links and further reading. By the way if you’re enjoying the podcast I love it you to review it in iTunes
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine!
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Enjoying the show? Please leave a review in iTunes. It helps other people find us.
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Hands up who’s over the narrow view of beauty peddled by mainstream fashion brands and media! Elisa Goodkind wants us to take back our power from magazines, advertising and the money-driven global fashion business, so that getting dressed each day becomes an act of self-love.
With their platform StyleLikeU New Yorkers Elisa and her daughter Lily Mandelbaum are breaking down the fake stereotypes about what’s beautiful, and what’s supposedly not.
They’ve published a new booked called True Style is What's Underneath: The Self-Acceptance Revolution. They take their message on the road, holding open castings and talks around the world. And they make intimate documentary-style video portraits that “explore how style is not about trends, money or presenting a façade of photoshopped perfection”.
No wonder these videos have gone viral – with over 35 million views. What comes across more than anything when you watch them is how we are all the same in our difference.
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine!
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Enjoying the show? Please leave a review in iTunes. It helps other people find us.
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In our final Episode for Plastic Free July, Clare interviews American visual artist Marina DeBris. Marina calls herself a “trashion” designer, as well as an environmental activist, and anti-plastics campaigner. She makes her "Beach Couture" collections from rubbish she finds washed up on beaches.
There’s a history of fashion designers referencing refuse. John Galliano's controversial Couture 2000 collection for Christian Dior featured newspaper prints inspired by homeless people’s makeshift blankets. Vivienne Westwood has also dabbled in derelicte chic (like Mugatu in Zoolander). Jean Paul Gaultier once made a frock out of a bin liner – he named it his “rubbish bag dress” (in French). Jeremy Scott’s Autumn '17 Moschino collection was inspired by cardboard packaging. But these designers used luxurious fabrics to render the garbage theme gorgeous.
Marina comes from a very different place. She doesn’t want her work to be considered chic, fabulous or fashionable. She wants it to shock you.
So there’s a bustier embellished with discarded plastic utensils. A gown fashioned from the flimsy, floaty remnants of old white plastic carrier bags. She’s made dresses from polystyrene containers, old nappies, bed springs, even dead bird’s wings.
In this Episode we talk about why she makes her work, how she does it, and what sort of reactions she gets. Fashion can be a conduit for cultural conversation, so why not hijack it and use as a frame of reference for political art? That’s what Marina does with her provocative, confronting project trashion. Can you wear it? IF YOU DARE!
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine!
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Enjoying the show? Please leave a review in iTunes. It helps other people find us.
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Montaigne, AKA Jessica Cerro, shot to fame while she was still in school thanks to Triple J’s Unearthed High competition. Now 21, she’s made a name for herself as one of the most interesting and original new Australian recording artists.
Rolling Stone describes her vocals as “astonishingly powerful and expressive”, praising her debut album, Glorious Heights, as: “an enthralling listen, with pin-balling pop melodies and irrepressible hooks.”
Equally enthralling is her mindful approach to everything from conscious consumption – she’s a vegan, and a dedicated thrift-store fan - to politics. Anyone who watched the ARIAs this year will no doubt remember Montaigne appearing with “people over profit” daubed across her chest in black paint.
In this Episode we talk about millennial values, how the older generation has no right to screw up the planet for those who will inherit their mistakes, and Montaigne’s sartorial mission to dress “swashbuckling, somewhat medieval but also kind of Amish and vampire-esque” on stage. Often in the work of emerging ethical fashion designers. Sometimes in frills and furbelows upcycled from old curtains.
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine!
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
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Kalpona Akter is Executive Director of the Bangladesh Centre for Worker Solidarity. An inspirational and influential figure in the country's union movement, she is a former child labourer who began working in a garment factory at age 12.
By 17, she'd been fired for standing up for her own rights, and those of her colleagues. ‘The day they fired this noisy woman, was the day they made a big mistake,’ she says.
Eighty per cent of garment workers are women, most aged between 18 and 25. Most have children and aren't paid nearly enough for their toils. The minimum wage in Bangladesh is about AUD $67 per month...
In this powerful Episode, Kalpona tells her story, explains what it’s really like for the 4 million garment workers in Bangladesh, and shares her thinking on Made in Bangladesh.
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine!
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
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TOME is a New York-based fashion label. Designers Ramon Martin & Ryan Lobo are known for collaborating with, and taking inspiration from, female artists. This season they looked to the Guerrilla Girls for a show inspired by the Women’s Marches and the Trump administration's attacks on Planned Parenthood. How can high fashion combine the pursuit of gorgeousness with serious messages about diversity and equality? What role does the runway have to play? ‘We underestimate the power of beauty and humour to help us connect,’ says Ramon.
In this Episode, we discuss fashion activism, sustainability, TOME’s White Shirt Project and winning fans like Amal Clooney and Sarah Jessica Parker. Getting dressed every morning is a political act. What you wear makes a statement about who you want to be and how you wish to communicate with the world around you. What’s your wardrobe saying?
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine!
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
Finally, if you enjoyed the show, we’d love you to leave a review on iTunes.
Music is by Montaigne http://www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Finally, if you enjoyed the show, we’d love you to leave a review on iTunes.
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Dr. Jennifer Lavers sees seabirds as sentinels of marine health. Are we listening to what they’re telling us? Her work as a scientist attached to the University of Tasmania's Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies focuses on birdlife, but recently she's been looking to art and fashion to help get the message out too.
Jennifer appears in the new film Blue about the state of our seas. And she’s working with her friend Marina De Bris, who shows her ‘trashion’ concept (fashion garments made entirely from ocean plastic rubbish) on the runway.
In this Episode, Jennifer tells the story of her research on remote Henderson Island in the South Pacific and its debris-littered beaches. What happens to plastic when it enters our waters? What’s the deal with bioaccumulation? Why are microplastics linked to the fashion industry? How can we turn the story of ocean plastic around?
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine!
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
Music is by Montaigne www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Finally, if you enjoyed the show, we’d love you to leave a review on iTunes.
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Timo Rissanen is Assistant Professor of Fashion Design and Sustainability at Parsons The New School for Design, New York. He’s an expert in zero-waste fashion design, as well as a cross-stitch artist currently stitching a letter to humanity to be read 100 years from now. Oh, and he's a birdwatcher…
Timo teaches his students to rethink traditional ways of approaching design to consider the entire lifecycle of a garment, and factor in reducing waste from the outset. But it’s not just about cutting waste from initial design...Of approximately 80 billion garments produced every year, about 1/3 are sold full price, 1/3 on sale, and 1/3 are never sold. Much of this surplus is destroyed. In this Episode, Timo argues that we must conquer our cynicism and use our creativity to find solutions. The fashion industry, which he describes a ‘seemingly grotesque, wasteful, deadly’, is also a source of endless possibility.
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine!
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
Music is by Montaigne www.montaignemusic.com.au/
Finally, if you enjoyed the show, we’d love you to leave a review on iTunes.
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Laura Wells is marine biologist, Insta girl and one of Australia's top curvy models. She is a greenie who divides her time between advocating for our imperilled oceans and modelling clothes. Why did a woman with two degrees, who thought modelling was a waste of time, decide to embrace life in front of the lens? What’s the deal with the ‘plus-size’ label? Why should we all get out more and embrace our wild spaces?
You’re going to love listening to Laura explain her journey from ‘animal-not-loving’ Sydney kid to butt-kicking saviour of our seas You’re going to love Laura full stop. Unless you’ve got a single-use plastics habit. Do not let Laura see you sucking on a so-called disposable coffee cup...
The WARDROBE CRISIS show notes unpack the issues addressed in each Episode. Way more than just links, it's like a mini magazine!
Head over to www.clarepress.com/ to read yours and #bethechange
Music is by Montaigne www.montaignemusic.com.au/ -
Way more than just frocks…WARDROBE CRISIS with Clare Press is the fashion podcast you’ve been waiting for and it launches June 14.
Join Clare and her guests as they decode the fashion system, and dig deep into its effects on people and planet. This show unzips the real issues that face the industry today, with a focus on ethics, sustainability, consumerism, activism, identity and creativity.
Hit subscribe and be the first to listen on June 14.