For Natalie Dean, designer of English luxury brand Beyond Skin, being green may not be easy, but it’s worth it.

Beyond Skin designer Natalie Dean

She sources eco-friendly fabrics, practices free trade and refuses to use any animal by-products; all while producing decidedly sexy shoes. In this extended, exclusive interview originally published in the August issue of WSAToday, she discusses the challenges of starting an eco-friendly line, what new materials are on the horizon and why she hopes other brands will follow her lead.

Describe your spring '09 collection.
We have two collections; our exclusive luxury line, Sui Generis, and Beyond Skin, our more affordable line. This season Sui Generis is inspired by 1930s glamour combined with burlesque style, the theme of which is echoed throughout the entire collection. Sui Generis spring/summer ’09 offers a very relaxed color palette of nude and pastel shades, along with accents of bright reds and vivid turquoise, all enriched with delicate gold piping to add glamour and finesse to the designs.

Cherub

Is there anything that you can't do vegan that you'd like to?
No, nowadays the quality of faux leather fabrics is inconceivable. Some you would be hard-pressed to tell the difference. The best PUs I have found are in Italy where you can pretty much get anything from faux patents to kid or pig skin finishes.

What are retailers saying to you about the green aspect of your products?
Many of our stockists have actually sought out Beyond Skin because of our ethical philosophy, yet others have been influenced purely by design.

How are you green in your business?
Fundamentally we are a cruelty-free label. We endeavor to find the most eco-friendly fabrics and components from Europe ensuring EU standards, and source as locally to our factories as possible. We trade in a manner that is non-exploitative to humans, animals, and wherever possible, the wider environment. Using no animal products, we are sweatshop free. Our luxury Sui Generis line is handmade in England, and our Beyond Skin range is produced in Spain, both promoting ethically sound and less energy intensive working practices proving that fashion and ethics can go hand in hand.

Lisa

Are the people you're dealing with more educated about the green movement?
Generally our customer is more aware of the green movement and understands what it is to be an ethical consumer. The media has been an incredible force in propelling eco-consumerism into the mainstream, and this trend is set to keep growing. People are increasingly more driven to ask questions about the products they buy. They want to know where that product was made, by whom and what it is made from, and hopefully that trend will continue to grow.

Is going green still expensive, or is it getting cheaper?
Going green is generally a more expensive lifestyle choice. Like organic food, it will take time for prices to become more affordable to the less affluent consumer. Increased demand will obviously help drive some of these prices down, but until the consumer realizes that cheap prices come at a huge ethical cost, we have a fair way to go.

What is the hardest thing to make eco-friendly?
There are a number of factors that make it difficult to make a shoe completely sustainable and eco-friendly, but due to the eco-explosion and global warming, there is a lot development taking place in advancing more sustainable products. Our reliance on plastic is a problem that faces many industries long term. More and more companies are dabbling in technologies to replace plastic with hard resins that emulate plastic, such as hemp, that hopefully may eventually be used to replace plastic resin heels as their wood counterpart is often not cost effective.

Madeline

What trends are hot right now, in terms of women’s footwear?
Soft feminine silhouettes, a mixture of contrasting textures and materials along with natural colors and fibers. Green is the new black!

How do you strengthen your relationships with buyers and retailers?
We stay in touch with all of our stockists and find out how our lines are selling each season. It is important for us to know what silhouettes, colors, textiles and price points sold best in each country, as feedback is crucial to the success of our brand and the direction in which we take the labels.

What have been some of your biggest challenges in starting a footwear company and how did you overcome them?
The biggest challenges in setting up an ethical label are the constraints of traceability, sourcing materials, components and manufacturing in a fair and ethical manner while still having realistic profit margins.

What’s the next big thing?
Style-led eco fashion!

If you could change something about the industry, what would it be?
That there was a hell of a lot more corporate responsibility!

  More Expert Opinion Articles