It’s time to slow your style down
A made-to-measure design studio in Lincolnshire is offering a considered approach to updating your wardrobe with cool classics, says
Sustainability is fashion’s latest concern. British Elle magazine has dedicated its entire September issue to the cause, while global e-tailers are taking advice from Livia Firth’s sustainability consultancy Eco Age on how to improve their impact.
Ultimately, however, the awkward truth is that there is nothing ethical or environmentally palatable about the hysterical fashion cycles churning out clothes every quarter season. The production process – from cotton manufacturing, dyeing, washing – is crushing the natural world, and that’s before you even get on to opaque supply chains which can – in extreme cases – threaten basic human rights.
A problem any mass-producing high street brand has is that no matter how many “ethically aware” organic cottons they produce, continuing to purchase clothes in the manner and speed that we have become accustomed to is not sustainable. For any of us. What to do?
The fashion industry is a huge force which at its best creates and sustains millions in employment. No one’s going to stop buying new clothes. But, the onus must be on us to consider purchases carefully, and open our eyes to how our clothes come to be.
Encouragingly, this point of view, once the reserve of frustrated sideline observers is seeping through. The advent of social media has enabled a calmer, more connected way of buying considered design. Like-minded communities are coming together and making small but forceful changes.
Stalf, a Lincolnshire Wold-based brand helmed by 28-year-old Paris Hodson, is one such force. Hodson, like so many, set off to London in her early 20s to “follow her dream” of studying fashion at the University of Westminster. The dream was flawed. She left, disillusioned with the current fashion process, which she saw as unsustainable and unfair. Back at home in Lincolnshire she started work on a brand that she saw as the antithesis to this.
Three years ago, Stalf – a portmanteau of her grandparents’ names Stella and Alf – began in earnest. She wanted to “slow down” and “make clothes that women could live in every day, with a team who cared in the same way I did”. She explains that her “design focus is rooted not in what is popular this season, but the women who are buying my clothes. What do they do in them? How do they feel in them?”
It helps that she has a keen eye for style, and knack at creating simple pieces with a timeless appeal, but which feel relevant to current tastes. There is a distinct ease to her clothes, everything is cut slightly oversized: elasticated waist skirts, dresses, jumpsuits, cocoon trousers (both collection staples) and square-cut tops are created from the same fabrics so you can mix and match.
She buys her fabrics from a small Irish mill, who dye to her specifications. Each piece is made to order. Once the fabric has run out, the design is marked as sold out until a new delivery comes in. She keeps customers updated by newsletter and through her Instagram account as to when things are available to order again.
Items will be delivered within the three-week window it takes her nine-strong studio staff to create and send out. “We’re fairly unique in that we design, pattern cut and hand make every single garment in-house, under one roof. This won’t change. It’s central to what we do.” Her customers have grown through word of mouth, and Instagram, which as Hodson points out creates “a level playing field. It gives independent brands as much a chance as the big fashion players”. Happily, she says she “tends to find one person in an area that will buy from us, then a whole pocket of customers slowly build in that area”. Most turn into repeat customers, offering her invaluable feedback so she can ensure she caters to their specific needs. The website is beautifully designed and user-friendly. Equally both she and her team model the garments, so it is clear how things will look on different shapes and sizes. Her clothes run from a small (size 6-8) to XL (18-20), while pricing runs from £60 to £170. It’s an inclusive and authentic ethos – two more of fashion’s latest watch words. But this isn’t another inflated marketing campaign. It’s honest, careful, considered design. Which is perhaps the most sustainable way forward for us all.
Victoria Moss