At the beginning of Berlin Fashion Week, the Fashion Council Germany, together with its cooperation partners BIKINI BERLIN, showroom.de and Messe Frankfurt, announced the winners of the FCG German Sustain Concept during a fireside dinner chat at Hotel Zoo Berlin.
The FCG German Sustain Concept is a mentoring programme initiated to support up-and-coming German designers. Sponsored by the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) and in partnership with Neonyt, the global hub for fashion, sustainability and innovation by Messe Frankfurt, the programme provides mentoring support to Germany-based aspiring young talents and fashion brands with a focus on sustainability over a period of 24 months. The goal is to successfully establish the four winners on the market in the long term.
The partners are looking forward to mentoring the four winners as part of the FCG German Sustain Concept and being given the opportunity to support them in further developing their sustainability-focused business models:
Lara Krude - www.larakrude.com
Often - www.ashleymarchovelle.com
Phylyda - www.phylyda.de
Working Title - www.workingtitlestudios.com
After the end of the six-week application phase, which started in November 2018, ten finalists – as well as the four selected participants, this also included Abury (www.abury.net), Buki Akomolafe (www.bukiakomolafe.com), hellmuth. Tanja Hellmuth Studios (www.hellmuthstudios.com), Jan’n’June (www.jannjune.com), Natascha von Hirschhausen (www.nataschavonhirschhausen.com) and Sepideh Ahadi (www.sepidehahadi.com) – all presented their brands and concepts to the jury members Andrea Karg (Allude), Antje Leinemann (Bikini Berlin), the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, Christiane Arp (FCG & Vogue Germany), Christina Oster-Daum (Cosnova), Claudia Hofmann (FCG), Danaja Vegelj (Showroom.de), Grit Thoennissen (Der Tagesspiegel), Jörg Ehrlich (Odeeh), Kerstin Schneider (Harper’s Bazaar Germany), Magdalena Schaffrin (Neonyt) and Melissa Drier (fashion journalist and consultant).
Coinciding with the recent edition of Berlin Fashion Week, it was also important for BIKINI BERLIN, in addition to its involvement in the German Sustain Concept, to draw the attention of its visitors to the concept shopping mall’s sustainability efforts by initiating another project going by the name “Your bag, our donation”. The mission is to move away from fast fashion in favour of a more environmentally conscious approach. Passers-by are being asked to collect plastic bags around Kurfürstendamm and for every bag that is handed in, a donation will be made to a sustainable concept.
Parallel to this, more than ten tenants are showing their contribution to sustainable consumption on information signs around the mall. Customers and visitors to BIKINI BERLIN can therefore find out, for example, that GANT works together with fishermen in the Mediterranean to reduce plastic waste. The collected waste is used to make yarn for the label’s shirts. Denim brand CLOSED also uses environmentally friendly procedures in the production of its garments, using the “Ozone” wash cycle, which requires significantly less water, to make their jeans. The brand is also involved in numerous research programmes for the development of new and sustainable production methods.
