Loomstate (the Great) has turned out a new addition for summer: organic cotton boardshorts. These boardshorts are bright, fun and functional…and a far cry from the organic jeans for which they’re famous. Scott Hahn, the brain behind the brand, did grow up surfing on Fire Island, so perhaps board shorts by Loomstate are simply a natural progression. If you’re in the Hamptons for Summer 2008, these boardshorts are the au courant choice of the season.

Now, if I was dressing my man in spendy sustainable swimwear, I think I’d choose a different look than the clunky Vans that are weighing this Loomstate model down. He is deeply in need of some eco flip flops like the recycled car tire sandals from Splaff or the hemp and bamboo flip flops in Simple’s Green Toe collection. These sustainable summer footwear choices will keep any man cooler-in more ways than one.

These organic cotton hats from design team Josh Fischer and Jules Blaine have LA flavor written all over them. Can’t you see Pam, Britney, or Jessicas (1-3) hiding out under one of these at Urth Caffe in Hollywood? I can. Or perhaps, with the socially and ecologically conscious angle of California Rising, one of their caps will be topping Madge off on her morning run any day now.

This young company is really rockin’ the sustainable fashion front with their hand embroidered caps made in the good ol’ US of LA. Manufacturing in Los Angeles is making a huge comeback with local designers doing the extra legwork to find affordable ways to cut, sew, and dye right in town, rather than asking the hardworking Chinese nation to do it all for them. Kudos.

California Rising also has a fun line of casual separates that feature stripes and more stripes (so big this season) in eco-friendly materials such as hemp, organic cotton jersey, and locally grown cotton slub. Slub? Yes, it’s the first time I’ve heard of it too. Apparently, slub is a type of textured yarn, and California Rising is proud to have developed their own version of locally knitted…slub. All their garments are colored with low impact dyes and they are another stellar member of Yvon Chouinard’s brainchild, 1% For The Planet. With hardcore ethics like these married to the originality of design coming out of LA these days, California may indeed be rising to the top.

Organic Stereo is a freshly emerging face of sustainable style, hailing from the hometown of eco fashion house Enamore-Brighton, England. Tokyo-born and Paris-raised designer Marie Rendina, launched her line just earlier this year. Her designs are very fresh, with a pinch of French nautical and a dash of Rock N’ Roll, making Organic Stereo a perfect summer match for the Echo Park hipster and the Holland Park scenester.

For Europeans, the line is virtually guilt-free. Organic Stereo keeps their carbon footprint lighter than most by limiting their manufacturing processes to Europe. OS grows and spins their cotton in Turkey, does their cut-sew-and-dye in Portugal, and warehouses all their garments in the UK. Their cotton is certified organic by SKAL
and their dying process is free of toxic chemicals, dyes, and heavy metals and certified by Oeko-tex.

When it comes to the details of ethical fashion, Marie Rendina has gone the extra mile. She wraps her line in biodegradable material, rather than the usual plastic bags that protect individual garments during the shipping process. Most of the buttons on Organic Stereo clothing are made in Italy with a new technique that fashions the buttons from 70% recycled paper. The tags for Organic Stereo Swing are made from recycled paper with natural straw strings, making them fully biodegradable.

Organic Stereo has definitely come out of the box with integrity and style; we can only hope next season’s expansion of the line will turn up the volume on this Brighton brand a few notches more.

Due to numerous stigmas surrounding the herb marijuana, hemp fabric has been a tough sell in the fashion market until just recently. Though “industrial hemp” is legal to use in the US, growing it is not. Hemp fabric is generally imported to the US by China, Hungary, Thailand, Romania and Chile. The farming of hemp requires no pesticides or herbicides, requires little water, and actually helps clear soil of toxins by a process called “phytoremediation,” making it far superior to cotton production. As sustainability struts to the forefront of fashion, designers have started taking note of this fiber, once thought of as the type of material found in flour sacks, not Sak’s Fifth Avenue.

During the California Gold Rush of the 1850’s, this extremely durable fabric was used for the very first pair of jeans by Levi Strauss. Even with all the cultivation challenges, hemp still makes its way into plenty of American closets today. Simple, Adidas, and New Balance are using this strong, biodegradable material for their super fly sneaker styles. Eco fashion lines like Habitude and Mountains Of The Moon have sexy,

sophisticated dresses and tops of hemp and silk blends. Recent collections by fashion giants Armani and Dolce & Gabbana have featured fiercely taylored hemp suits. Green bag designers Helen E. Riegle and GreenOne utilize this fabric for their handbags and totes, and emerging brands like Hoodlamb are using uber warm hemp-based fake fur in their urban wear.

Though the DEA may still find the use of industrial hemp controversial, the eco fashion world has embraced it for its durability, not its smokability.

An icon of the modern environmental movement, Simran Sethi, is hosting a web TV show for Sundance Channel called The Good Fight. The show brings attention to an important topic many times overlooked by the media, Environmental Justice. Who lives near the electric plants, factories, toxic waste facilities, and garbage dumps? Quite often, it’s low-income families, racial minorities, and residents of developing nations. Simran meets the leaders and participants of the environmental justice movement to explore ways to even the playing field for human habitat. “Climate change has no boundaries and we all have a shared stake,” commented Sethi. “The Good Fight is an attempt to illuminate areas people may not have considered in regards to environmentalism, such as water access, architecture and green-collared jobs. We’ve been made aware of saving the whales, saving the trees—we also need to be saving our communities.”

We realize this topic is not exactly in the eco fashion realm, but we figured eco fashion divas have to entertain themselves somehow when not shopping for the hottest looks in sustainable style, right? …Though Simran definitely rocks the green designers! Had to say it.

Sandy Skinner of ecoSkin continues to turn out hot LA disco glam designs for the summer. Made of a sleek blend of 67% bamboo and 28% tencel, with a touch of 5% spandex, her sexy dresses continue to impress both eco fashionistas and Hollywood starlets alike.

Skinner has really gone the extra mile when it comes to crafting her garments responsibly. Unlike many designers using bamboo fabric these days, Skinner imports the raw bamboo fiber from China and has it spun it locally in LA so that she can oversee all the aspects of manufacturing this sometimes controversial fabric.

Even though costs are greatly increased with domestic manufacturing, Sandy believes it’s absolutely worth it. The fabric is woven and the garments are all dyed in LA, so that, according to Skinner, she can go to sleep at night knowing that she’s made the best decisions possible for the environment and the people who create her fabrics. “Yes, bamboo’s not perfect. No fabric is. But it’s certainly better than using a rayon or poly and it’s only going to get better if we continue to push for better ways of manufacturing it.” She says the fabric makers are the slowest sector of the fashion industry to react to the market, but they will most certainly change if designers and shoppers continue to ask for better practices.

Through talking with Sandy, it became plainly obvious that this is one of the designers out there making the tough decisions to do the right thing, even though it takes more time and costs more money. Skinner’s the real deal and that will certainly help all us eco divas go to sleep at night knowing we were the hottest mama at the party in one of her dresses.

This autumn, look out for ecoSkin’s fresh new looks in hemp silk!

Tierra Forte of Del Forte denim was featured recently on The Sundance Channel’s The Green, and for good reason. Tierra has been deeply involved in the greening of the fashion industry, from her partnership with the Sustainable Cotton Project to provide education on organic farming to agricultural workers to her cutting edge denim recycling program, Rejeaneration. Del Forte’s 100% organic cotton denim line is Made In The USA. Get a behind-the-scenes peek at Tierra’s factory in El Paso, TX…

“Give someone a fish, and they eat for a day. Teach someone to fish and they eat for a lifetime.”

Ali Hewson, Bono, and Rogan Gregory continue to spread the message of Trade Not Aid for African countries with the Edun label. Edun is devoted to bringing financial sustainability to countries like Uganda, Tunisia, Mauritius, and Lesotho through farming and producing as much of their label in Africa as possible, from “grower to sewer.”

Launched in 2005, the line continues each year to increase its organic cotton content, creating safer farming and factory conditions for the people in Edun’s supply chain. Their styles are posh and whimsical, using imagery from nature in almost every garment. By putting the Trade Not Aid philosophy and cutting edge design to work, Edun gives struggling people a path to sustainability. Ashe.

Check out this segment on Edun from The Green on Sundance Channel…