THE ROOT | Episode 4 | The Future Of Fashion

The Root Episode 4: The Future Of Fashion is broken down in 4 lightening talk segments, hosted by Dominique Drakeford. Part 1 discuses Marketing with Aditi Mayer & Terumi Murao. Part 2 hones in on Education with Kimberly Jenkins and Whitney McGuire. Part 3 dives into Small Business Entrepreneurship with Akilah Stewart and Ibada Wadud. Lastly, Part 4 contextualizes the landscape of Policy with Ify Ike and Ayesha Barenblat.

PART 1, MARKETING

TERUMI MURAO

Terumi Murao is a sustainable stylist and model who works in the fashion and commercial advertising industry. She has worked previously in scientific research, luxury hospitality, and marketing for design & technology. Her curiosity and creative restlessness continually drive her to imagine and iterate on new human-centered, sustainable solutions. She cares deeply about fashion as a tool for personal growth, and a platform to elevate underrepresented voices and advocate for justice.

Images below curated by Terumi Murao

  1. Terumi works with Rockaway-based non profit Laru Beya, a family run organization that offers free surfing and swimming lessons to Black and Brown youth. She loves to coach the young surfers in the water, but also facilitates corporate partnerships and acts as treasurer. More on Faherty Brand Blog

  2. Most intrinsically in tune with nature, Terumi centers her work in the fashion industry around nature whenever possible and increasing access for underrepresented groups. She is currently a stylist for Outdoor Research and is developing a capsule collection made from their dead-stock materials. More on Outdoor Research Blog

  3. Wearing many hats—how COVID-19 has encouraged models to take on more creative roles in photo shoots, Article in Allure

  4. Terumi’s entry point into the fashion industry was through secondhand clothing. She has been 100% secondhand with her own wardrobe for over five years, and does so for commercial sets as much as possible too. Finding beauty in discarded things brings her most joy. Terumi’s Website

  5. In a continual quest to marry her two worlds of adventure sports and fashion, Terumi began the #skatethruootd series, a self-captured set of secondhand outfits on her skateboard.

  6. Check out Terumi’s secondhand style on Instagram

Links to Terumi’s work:

ADITI MAYER

Aditi Mayer is a sustainable fashion blogger, photographer, and journalist whose work explores the intersections of style, sustainability, and social justice. Seeing fashion's disproportionate effects on communities of color globally, she began her blog, ADIMAY.com, after the Bangladesh Rana Plaza factory in 2014. She has become a frequent speaker on topics of social and environmental justice, with recent collaborators including Human Rights Watch, Timberland, Planet Home, Vegan Fashion Week, and more. Currently, she is working with the Garment Workers Center to elevate stories of labor exploitation in LA.

Images below curated by Aditi Mayer

PART 2, EDUCATION

Whitney McGuire

Whitney McGuire is an attorney for creative entrepreneurs. She is also a co-founder of Sustainable Brooklyn, and co-founder of the record label swiMMMers ear with her husband. She became an emerging leader in the field of Fashion Law and is former chairperson of Fashion Law Week, the first week-long symposium dedicated to educating the community about legal issues impacting the fashion industry. Through her work, she champions the sustainability of those hailing from targeted communities including artists and advocates.

Images below curated by Whitney McGuire

  1. "In The Future, Black People Are..." is a project Whitney started after the murder of George Floyd, Nina Pop, Breonna Taylor and so many others. It is a project based in radical re-imagining (unintentionally) riffing off of Alisha B. Wormsley’s "There are Black People in the Future" work. This project can be accessed here: inthefuture.whitneyrmcguire.com

  2. "In The Future, Black People Are..."

  3. Whitney speaking at Eileen Fisher about the Future of Sustainable Fashion

  4. Fashion Law Week 2013 Executive Board with honoree

  5. Fashion Law Week 2012 Save the Date and schedule

  6. Dressed in Dreams by Tanisha C. Ford

Links to follow Whitney’s work:

Kimberly Jenkins

Kimberly Jenkins is Assistant Professor of Fashion Studies at Ryerson University, lecturing previously at Parsons School of Design and Pratt Institute. Kim became best known for designing a course and exhibition called Fashion and Race, and has shared her insights globally in industry forums and institutions. Her expertise on fashion history and infusing 'race' into fashion theory education has led to consulting work for Gucci, Camera Nazionale della Moda Italiana, the Centraal Museum along with other corporate brands and organizations. Kim is the founder of The Fashion and Race Database, an online platform filled with open-source tools that expand the narrative of fashion history and challenge mis-representation within the fashion system.

Images below curated by Kimberly Jenkins

  1. Students enrolled in Kimberly's 'Fashion and Race' course at Parsons School of Design, Fall 2016. Photo credit: Kimberly Jenkins.

  2. Screenshot of The Fashion and Race Database, an online platform to decentralize and decolonize fashion, founded in 2017 by Kimberly Jenkins. Art credit: Fabiola Jean-Louis. Image credit: Kimberly Jenkins.

  3. Kimberly Jenkins hosting a panel discussion, 'Fashion, Culture & Justice: A NYFW Dialogue,' Fall 2017. The panel was conceptualized by Jenkins and designer Becca McCharen-Tran and was commemorated by The New School as 'Dialogues that have shaped The New School for 100 years' (The New School at Medium.com, August 2019). Photo credit: Jonathan Grassi.

  4. A Fifth Avenue-street view of Kimberly's 2018 exhibition, 'Fashion and Race: Deconstructing Ideas, Reconstructing Identities.' Photo credit: Kimberly Jenkins.

  5. Kimberly Jenkins giving a lecture that juxtaposes two historically relevant covers of Vogue. This photo was taken during The Fashion and Justice Workshop, hosted by Jenkins and Dr. Jonathan M. Square at Columbia College in Chicago. 2019. Photo credit: Jacqueline Wayne Guite.

  6. Kimberly Jenkins standing between designer Alessandro Michele and CEO Marco Bizarri in Milan, Italy. Kimberly was invited as an educator for Gucci in 2019.

Links to follow Kimberly’s work:

PART 3, SMALL BUSINESS + ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Akilah Stewart

Akilah Stewart is a sustainable lifestyle RE-programmer, community organizer and the founder of FATRA. Focusing on creative waste management, FATRA is known for transforming single use plastic and dead stock material into the“Recycled Bottle Bag” -- RE-inventing the way we define traditional luxury products by incorporating raw materials and alternative design methods. As a first generation American born to Caribbean parents, Akilah Stewart shares sustainability through an indigenous vantage point - one that REconnects us with working with our hands, respecting the land, and encourages us to make something from nothing.

Images below curated by Akilah Stewart

Ibada Wadud

Ibada Wadud is the Founder & Head of Impact at LULAH and a member of the Adjunct Faculty at Parsons School of Design in the Department of Design Strategies. LULAH makes better handbags designed in Brooklyn to employ formerly incarcerated women. In 2019, LULAH received the Girlboss Foundation Prize, was featured in New York Magazine's The Cut, and participated in Essence Festival in New Orleans. Prior to founding LULAH, Ibada was a member of the Corporate Social Responsibility team at Kate Spade, and has worked with Ermenegildo Zegna, Gucci and Fendi. She has particularly focused on artisan communities throughout her career with a concentration on economic development. Ibada recently joined The Slow Factory team where she contributes her Design Justice practice to advocate for diversity, equity and inclusion within sustainability.

Images below curated by Ibada Wadud

  1. Aisha Radellant and Jameka Johnson graduated from LULAH's inaugural training program. The ceremony was hosted by Mara Hoffman and the Women's Prison Association and more than 100 leaders in NYC's fashion industry.

  2. Ibada Wadud, founder of LULAH, joined supermodel and social justice advocate, Ebonee Davis and celebrity stylist and host, June Ambrose, at the 25th annual Essence Festival in New Orleans to discuss social and racial equity in the fashion industry as part of the "Mission Minded" panel.

  3. LULAH is reimagining classic American heritage in the likeness of women of color. LULAH's 12-week program was based in Brooklyn and trained 5 women who are justice-involved in handbag design and construction. The launch of LULAH's signature handbag, The Marg, will be announced in Fall 2020. 

  4. Less than 1% of Black women receive venture capital. Ibada Wadud, Founder of LULAH, was selected to participate in the inaugural cohort of When Founder Meet Funder, a program spearheaded by All Raise and Unusual VC for Black Women Founders to tackle the lack of diversity and inclusion in venture capital. This bootcamp was hosted by Y Combinator, the leading Silicon Valley accelerator, which has been recognized for launching companies like Dropbox and Airbnb. Participants were greeted with remarks by Y Combinator CEO, Michael Seibel (pictured), who was recently appointed as CEO of Reddit. In addition, founders attended workshops, received mentoring and pitched to leading venture capital partners (that's Ibada in the back row in green).

  5. Shop Lulah, Freedom From Baggage, Designed For Life’s Transitions

  6. Ibada and Lulah, 2019 Girlboss Grant Winner

Links to follow Ibada’s work:

PART 4, POLICY

Ayesha Barenblat

Ayesha Barenblat (@remakeourworld) is the founder of Remake, a nonprofit organization dedicated to building a community of conscious consumers, and engaging millennial shoppers through films, visual storytelling and immersive journeys to connect us as humans back to makers. In the past, she led brand engagement at Better Work, a World Bank and United Nations partnership to ensure safe and decent working conditions around the world. Prior to this, she was head of consumer products at BSR, providing strategic advice to brands including H&M, Levi Strauss & Co., Marks and Spencer, Nike, and The Walt Disney Company.

Images below curated by Ayesha Barenblat

  1. The #PayUp movement, a global coalition of garment workers, labor organizations and citizen advocates, has fought for and won an incredible $22 billion owed by big brands to their garment workers for cancelled clothing orders since March. Building on the movements’ incredible success and the clear-cut need for major industry reforms, #PayUp is taking its campaign to the next level and launching a long-term vision for change called PayUp Fashion, which lays out concrete, actionable labor rights goals.

  2. PayUp Fashion is a coalition of garment workers, union leaders, activists, and concerned citizens to center worker voices and demands in the future of fashion. The cancellation crisis proved that we need systemic reforms in fashion and to center workers moving forward. 

  3. Sign the #PayUp Petition here >

  4. As of this week, Payup Fashion will begin to pressure 40 major brands and retailers to not only #PayUp for cancelled orders, but to also Keep Workers Safe and Go Transparent.

Links to follow Ayesha’s work:

Ifeoma Ike

Ifeoma Ike is a Nigerian-American attorney, artist and social change designer. With a vast career, ranging from Wall Street to Capitol Hill to on the ground movement lawyering, Ifeoma is the Founding Partner of equity strategy firm, Pink Cornrows. Recognized in 2019 by HBO & Vanity Fair for her justice and policy record, “Ify” is a thought partner for leaders committed to disrupting the status quo and creating a society that is just and fair for those traditionally marginalized.

Images below curated by Ifeoma Ike

  1. The Atlanta Washerwomen Strike of 1881, article in New America

  2. Picking cotton

  3. Picking cotton

  4. Picking cotton

Links to follow Ify’s work:

This week’s episode is in partnership with:

 

MATE is a clean essentials brand made sustainably in Los Angeles with non-toxic, natural and Organic materials. MATE hooked our show up with a discount code — use ROOT20 for 20% off and for first purchases only.

LEARN MORE at MATEthelabel.com >

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Planet, Circular Economy, Waste, Style, Farming, People, The Root, Season 4Kestrel Jenkinsethical fashion, future of fashion, conscious style, ethical style, fashion revolution, ethical fashion podcast, sustainable fashion, garment industry, transparency, who made my clothes, circularity, the root, racism as a systemComment