A Deeper Luxury - First Published in Verve Magazine November 2009
Your designer totes and stilettos might actually have a heart. As the key green values of sustainability and conservation begin to be imbued within the practices and philosophies of major international luxe brands, concern about the planet is no longer limited to the rarefied mumbo-jumbo of a few environmental activists. Roopa Barua traces the changing face of luxury across the world as well as at home
An office terrace at Champs Elysées, Paris sports a cultivated beehive nest, a green warehouse of the same company has wooden beams instead of cement pillars and more than half the goods of this company are sent to their destinations by ship to reduce pollution by jet fuel. If you think this is a tree-hugging, sprout-eating Greenpeace green-neck outfit, think again. This is none other than the largest purveyor of luxury goods, Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy.
A depleting ozone layer and shrinking polar caps make the global citizen increasingly conscious of eco-sustainability and carbon footprints. Put simply, they want to stop the destruction of nature and preserve the earth for their children and grandchildren. For decades the luxury industry has maintained a general alienation from the masses. However, as the world becomes flatter and environmental consciousness spreads, this industry has also come under major scrutiny. Famous labels including GAP and Kate Moss have been accused of unfair labour practices. The glamour of the catwalk contrasts with the squalor of the sweatshop. The Deeper Luxury report sponsored by the WWF in 2007 stated, “Luxury brands fail to match the environmental and social efforts of companies in most other consumer sectors, both in the quality of their policies and in their operations.”
The Louis Vuitton group was one of the earliest companies to incorporate the environment in its charter. In 1992 after the United Nations Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Bernard Arnault, Chairman and CEO of the LVMH Group (Moet Hennessy-Louis Vuitton which includes Louis Vuitton, Moet Hennessy, Parfums Christian Dior, Parfums Givenchy, Chopin, Marc Jacobs, Emilio Pucci, Donna Karan, Hublot, Tag Heuer, etc.) created a Board of Directors for the environment. Since then, the group has introduced green buildings, maintained quality supply chains and constantly innovates in the areas of custom packaging and shipping.
Among the jewellery brands, Tiffany, Cartier, Piaget and Van Cleef & Arpels have adopted sustainable design for jewellery, especially diamonds. The mining of diamonds in Africa has created conflicts because of financial rewards. Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia and Sierra Leone have been the worst hit by these battles. The bloodshed prompted film-maker Edward Zwick to make his famous Hollywood film Blood Diamond, portraying gang warfare incited by diamonds. According to him, “When we buy things in one place, it has repercussions someplace else…. When we put our credit card down, we endorse a corporation and their practices and what it takes and how it affects thousands if not millions of lives.”
The Kimberley Process has been created to stem the flow of rough diamonds to rebel forces that use them to fund gang activities. However, there are significant weaknesses that undermine the effectiveness of the Kimberley Process and allow trade in blood diamonds to continue. Tiffany, the environmental crown jewel among big jewellery brands, takes their charter a step further and only uses diamonds that come out of their subsidiary, Laurelton Diamonds, a company that manages their entire diamond supply chain. Tiffany doesn’t use coral, as there is no sustainable way to harvest corals. Rubies from Myanmar, where 90 per cent of the world’s rubies originate, are also a no-no given the country’s history of human rights abuses.
L’Oréal has placed CEO John-Paul Agon at the head of the company’s climate change efforts. The holding company which houses 25 brands including Lancôme, Cacharel, Kerastase Paris, Redken, Vichy and Shu Uemura has made significant progress in reducing energy use and greenhouse gas emissions from its own operations, setting and surpassing energy and emission reduction targets annually.
The fashion industry has also embraced technology to reduce its carbon footprint. Of late, biannual shows have been criticised as a drain on resources, including the adding up of air miles. Designers are now exploring new ways to reach the masses. At the recently concluded fashion weeks from New York to Milan, Alexander McQueen, Burberry and Dolce & Gabbana broadcast their shows online. Bloggers with laptops were a common sight on all the front rows. Fashion entrepreneur of Indian origin Vidya Narine has started the online fashion portal Lenewblack, where designers can showcase and buyers purchase virtually, reducing the need for air travel and hence reducing the carbon footprint. 70 labels have shown their collections so far, including Colette (Paris), Saks Fifth Avenue (USA), The Number Four (Kuwait) and Bombay Electric (India).
Nothing shines brighter than a celebrity endorsing a product. Hollywood star Leonardo DiCaprio drives a hybrid car, has a solar panelled home, flies commercial and co-wrote and co-produced the environmental documentary The Eleventh Hour. He is also the brand ambassador for TAG Heuer and is part of their ‘What are you made of?’ campaign. According to Jean-Christophe Babin, CEO TAG Heuer, TAG Heuer chose DiCaprio because he is very committed to saving the environment. DiCaprio uses royalties from this deal to support major environmental initiatives.
U2 singer Bono and his wife created organic clothing line EDUN, out of a desire to create trendy clothing while fostering sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa. They work at the micro-level in countries like India, Peru, Tunisia, Kenya, Uganda, Lesotho, Tanzania, Mauritius and Madagascar. Over the past decade, as the luxury markets broaden and the consumer becomes more product-savvy, paradigm shifts have come for major purveyors in terms of the quality of their supply chain. The old cover of murkiness and ignorance is being replaced with a quest for going green and transparent.
Tom Ford sums it up starkly: “Luxury is not going out of style. It needs to change its style.” As he puts it, “We need to replace hollow with deep.”
Do Indian brands have a conscience?The past few years have seen the Indian luxury markets skyrocket. Foreign luxury brands that have opened stores in major Indian metros try to keep their environmental charter consistent. However the level of awareness among Indian brands is low to absent. Indian fashion, jewellery and beauty products that have started seeking global identity have either been lax about the environment so far or are taking baby steps in that direction.
Wendell Rodricks, with his clean modernist lines and a Goan sand-and-sea philosophy, has been one of the few established designers to try and fit organic and eco-friendly into his approach. He has worked with eco-fabrics in the past and is involved with an NGO that does natural dyes with tribals. He says, “With the world thinking along lines of global warming and eco-friendly materials, it is only natural that the fashion world responds with a conscience in these areas. In fact, since fashion is looked at increasingly as a vanity-driven ego ride, it becomes imperative that fashion and fashion designers look to creating products that are answerable to a new world consciousness.” Upcoming designer-duo Dev r Nil has worked with bamboo blends for hotel uniforms. And designer Samant Chauhan represented India at the Paris Ethical Fashion Week by showcasing Ahimsa silk – a new method to manufacture silk without killing the silkworm.
Ayurveda and natural products have been the mainstay of Indian heath products for centuries. So it comes as no surprise that companies in India have been able to formulate products based on these principles for skincare and make-up. The lines are smaller compared to their international organic counterparts and the efforts fragmented but companies like Forest Essentials, Himalaya Herbals, Iraya and Kama Ayurveda are poised to become global brands. Forest Essentials, with their ‘Nurture with Nature’ philosophy, have recently entered into a partnership with Estée Lauder that will greatly help in its research efforts and help it grow sustainably.
Jewellery as a luxury purchase is another story completely. Over 90 per cent of the world’s diamonds are brought to Surat, Gujarat to be cut and polished. According to the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre, a sufficient percentage of these diamonds are purchased in the black market from the Ivory Coast and Liberia and could very likely be blood diamonds. The stones brought in by dhows and fishing boats through Gujarat’s west coast makes a mockery of the processes that are in place to stem the flow of blood diamonds. Diamond merchants operating within India are aware of this but ignore it because the customer is either ill-informed or chooses to turn a blind eye to this practice. The same goes for the mining of other precious stones and metals.
The democratisation of luxury
Luxury markets are maturing globally. As GenNext becomes the new consumer, there is a shift to a new way of thinking wherein true luxury is defined by a way of life that is more connected with the natural world. Luxury is wider, deeper and more intrinsic than ever before.
A luxury company’s legacy endures only when it is interpreted on the basis of contemporary values. A company’s heritage from the 19th or 20th century will not stay the same but will be interpreted on the basis of its activities in the 21st century. Modern-day heritage is all about preserving the planet. Luxury brands need to see this as an evolving phenomenon and work at creating their own heritage by shaping the future proactively.
Designer Gaurav Gupta sums it up beautifully. “Luxury is luxury only if it has a conscience. Conscience should be about design, quality, innovation, delivery and perfection. This is the only kind of luxury that will survive and exist in the future.”
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