Ethical Fashion Blog

My name is Ashley and I am a journalist at Columbia College Chicago.  I am currently writing a story on fair trade accessories and I was looking for some comments to add to the story.  I was wondering if you could tell me why you think fair trade is so important.  Any information you have will help.  Thank you for your time and I hope to hear from you.

Mata Traders is a fair trade fashion company, and we take both parts of that description very seriously.  Our clothes and jewelry are manufactured by women’s cooperatives and artisan groups in developing countries that pay fair wages and provide safe working conditions.  Our designs mix old-fashioned processes–such as hand loom weaving and hand block printing–with fashion-forward silhouettes and contemporary color palettes. Mata’s mission is to bring fair trade clothing to the forefront of the fashion industry–and to bring fashion to fair trade.

^ The motto of most Americans. We don’t have to wait, so why should we? With easy, cheap fashion at our fingertips, larger companies know that they have to keep up, but in doing so they often leave a trail of destruction in their path. With so many recent tragedies in eastern countries, there’s an abundance of informational articles and stories floating around. If you aren’t that familiar with the topic, none of the articles are as approachable as this one-minute video from Online MBA, which contains a concise summary of the impact of “fast fashion.”

Halloween is one of my favorite holidays.  It’s one of the few times that we can all tap into our inner child, dress up, and eat lots of candy.  And who doesn’t love candy?  But recently I learned that much of the chocolate handed out to children on Halloween is produced using child labor.  (For more information, click here.)  Let’s ensure that all children have a truly happy Halloween by supporting fair trade chocolate producers and avoiding chocolate that uses child labor.

Mata Traders does it once again.  Their color inspiration for this season was heavily deco-inspired.  They are calling it ‘Romantic Folk Style’.  The prints are modern and architectural, but the colors are soft and cozy – a great juxtaposition.  Each piece is injected with romance, each color combination is down-right pretty.  They beg to be layered up and worn on crisp fall days, or adorned with jewels and donned to a fancy party.  Mata’s Fall 2012 collection leaves you wanting more!

India has more child laborers than any other country in the world (somewhere between 12 to 45 million between the ages of 5 and 14), and trafficking or kidnapping is often part of the equation (32,000 children were reported missing in 2011).  Rather than improving the situation, India’s growing middle class has only exacerbated the problem with the demand for domestic workers (1 household in 20 employs an under-age servant).

Today is World Day Against Child Labor.  India has more child laborers than any other country in the world (somewhere between 12 to 45 million between the ages of 5 and 14), and trafficking or kidnapping is often part of the equation (32,000 children were reported missing in 2011).