Change fashion!
oikos Fashion is the knowledge sharing platform for sustainable apparel and textile industry practices within oikos International. It was founded in 2013 as oikos’ first long-term project on an inter-chapter basis. Today oikos Fashion comprises local project managers from the Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, France, Germany, Hungary and India.
Our vision and mission
oikos Fashion aims at influencing future fashion industry decision-makers and consumers to make responsible decisions that lead to scalable and sustainable fashion business solutions.
To empower the leaders of tomorrow – the students of today – to make these decisions, the project offers learning and networking opportunities, such as a bi-annual webinar series. Additionally oikos Fashion constantly works on the enhancement of a network for all fashion-related projects within oikos International.
To catch a glimpse of our members’ local projects, please see the websites of Future Fashion Day / Constance; Un-dress /St. Gallen or the Fesches Mascherl blog /Vihttps://oikos-international.org/wp-admin/post.php?post=4326&action=editenna.
At the moment there are no upcoming webinars.
- What is a webinar?
How do webinars work?
Our web-based seminars feature invited industry experts who present their business cases and expertise to the participants in 30 minutes. In the second half of the sessions students participate in a Q&A with the speakers. Those registered participants who cannot come online because of time zone differences or other reasons, have the chance to watch the recording of the webinar and discuss it in the discussion group created for the group.
In the era of information overload, the oikos Fashion webinars offer the opportunity of networked learning in the relatively new field of ecofashion and they are structured just like the more and more popular MOOCs (massive open online courses). As participants interact with the speakers and with one another, they gain practical insights into the topics and also develop a professional network.
- Webinar topics & speakers
In 2014, a series of webinars brought expertise into the oikos network.
May 12, 6pm CET – Leslie Johnston, C&A Foundation,
“C&A Foundation’s Sustainable Supplier Programme: Using Productivity Levers to Improve Wages and Well-Being”May 26, 6pm CET – Enrico Rima, Lebenskleidung,
“Democratizing the production – Collective buying at Lebenskleidung”June 11, 6pm CET – Philipp Meister, adidas Group,
“Sustainability at the adidas group”
In the Fall term of 2013 we brought together students from around the world who explored the business perspective behind ecofashion through the webinar series “Making the business case for sustainable fashion” with the following schedule:
- Claudia Kersten, Head of Marketing at GOTS: “Sustainable material sourcing”
- Kim Poldner, founder and editor of Eco Fashion World: “Top 10 Future Trends in Sustainable Fashion”
- Bert van Son, CEO of Mud Jeans: “Are you ready to lease your jeans? Circular economy in fashion”
- Patrick Laine, CEO of Better Cotton Initiative: “Business partnerships for better cotton”
- Debera Johnson, Executive Director of Pratt Design Incubator for Sustainable Innovation: “Change through sustainable design”
- Online project fair where participants could present their own thesis projects, start-ups and blogs including presentations from oikos Vienna’s succesful ecofashion blog , the T-shirt start-up No Nasties and a number of exciting student projects and thesis topics.
Earlier that year, in May-July 2013 oikos fashion launched its first introductory webinar sessions with the following schedule where 20 selected students participated.
- Johan Arnø Kryger – Danish Fashion Insitute, NICE senior manager:”Stakeholders in sustainable fashion”
- Dr. Pamela Ravasio – director of texSture consultancy, 2011 Observer Ethical Award winner: “Consumer trends in Europe”.
- Kavita Parmar – designer and CEO of the IOU Project: “Redesigning supply chain management”.
- Prakash Chandra Jha -CEO and designer of Cocccon: “Responsible sourcing case study”
- David Diatz – founder and CEO of US. ethical retailer Modavanti: “Advertising sustainable fashion: can sustainability be hot and trendy?”
Our unique multidisciplinary webinars created a continuous learning and networking opportunity for 60 dedicated international business students this year who had the chance to gain insights from 10 invited ecofashion experts from the fields of public affairs, business and design.
As sustainable fashion management courses are not yet available at universities, our free extracurricular webinars fill in a void in the current higher educational system.
We plan to map how our participants used the knowledge gained from the webinars in their academic work (i.e. thesis projects, blogs) and their professional lives (i.e. internships, career choice, start-up ideas) through continuous follow-up, once we close our current webinar sessions.
We hope to develop our initiative into a structured online learning and networking platform with case studies and more online assignments the next year as our vision and missions are to train future fashion business experts who make responsible business decisions in the future which lead to sustainable and scalable business solutions.
- Sophie Lorz, Team Lead, Germany
Sophie is currently studying International Fashion Retail at Reutlingen University in Germany, where she is also one of the presidents of the local oikos chapter. Oikos Reutlingen decided in an early stage of its development to focus on sustainability in fashion. Given this fact, oikos Fashion, for Sophie, seems to be the perfect platform to extend her chapter’s activities. Since 2014 she coordinates the activities of oikos Fashion.
- Madeline Schneider, PR and Marketing Manager, Austria
Madeline is a member of oikos Vienna since October 2012. Due to her interest in fashion, Madeline together with two other oikos Vienna members has created the sustainable fashion blog “fesches.mascherl” in order to present alternatives to fast-fashion and communicate the diversity of eco-fashion. Madeline studies and works at the Chair of Industry, Energy and Environment at the University of Vienna. At oikos Fashion she coordinates the social media activities of the group.
- Michaela Scalisi, Marketing Associate, Switzerland
Michaela is currently studying business economics at the University of St.Gallen. After helping the ecofashion show and conference, Un-dress come to life in 2013, she joined the oikos Fashion chapter in fall 2013. A blogger herself, she is very passionate about fashion and out of curiosity she wants to learn more about sustainable fashion. Through oikos fashion Michalea believes she will get the opportunity to participate in exciting projects and contribute to a more sustainable approach in fashion. Michaela is responsible for PR at oikos Fashion.
- Elena Bianchi, Marketing Associate, France
Elena is an HEC Lausanne student currently doing an exchange year at the Vienna University of Economics and Business. After being part of the founding team of oikos Lausanne, she joined oikos Fashion. Being part of the oikos Fashion team gave her the opportunity to reconcile both her interests in marketing and eco fashion. Next year, after completing her bachelor, she is planning to specialize in management of the creative industries. Elena is part of the oikos Fashion marketing team.
- Chitkala Doshi, Designer, India
Chitkala designs and supplies customized uniforms to the management institutes, schools, large corporate companies ,fitness clubs and saloons in India besides pursuing her post- graduation in Corporate Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Symbiosis International University where she co-founded the oikos Pune local chapter. In oikos Pune she is heading the oikos impact award winner eco-conscious project i-Green which aims to keep local rivers pollution free by composting.
- Leila Kazimli, Future Fashion Day Project Manager, Germany
Leila has been a member of oikos since April 2012 joining it as the president of oikos Konstanz. She is a Graduate student of British and American Studies/Marketing at the University of Konstanz, Germany and at York University, Toronto, Canada and she holds a BSc Degree in Economic Cybernetics, a BA Degree in British and American Studies. She is crazy about sustainable fashion, film, theatre, and dance. In 2013 she has initiated the Future Fashion Day in Konstanz and the oikos Konstanz team we has successfully implemented this ambitious project. Leila loves working with ambitious and motivated people in oikos and plans to organise the FFD this year as well with her team.
- Nora Locskai, oikos Fashion Alumni, Hungary
Nora was a co-founder and former president of the Budapest chapter of oikos in 2011 and a year later joined the oikos international management board to contribute to the development of the student network. As a International Economy&Business graduate intrigued by the fashion industry, Nora was the team lead of oikos Fashion, working online with the international team members to make great projects happen in Europe and India. She was also the coordinator of the first two webinars program.
- Francesca Stocco, oikos Lille Alumni, Italy/Switzerland
Founder and former president of oikos Lille at Edhec Business School in France, Francesca has organized sustainable fashion workshops at her university collaborating with the Ethical Fashion Forum (London) and the Ethical Fashion Show (Paris, Berlin). She wrote her master thesis on whether sustainability could be a competitive advantage for the luxury industry and conducted extensive research on the topic. Thanks to her expertise and passion for sustainability, she became one of the founding mothers of oikos Fashion and is currently supporting the initiative’s international reach.
Would you like to contribute to the oikos Fashion initiative as an oikos member, an enthusiastic business student or a sustainable conscious start-up? Are you interested in participating in our webinar program?
We would love to hear from you! Connect with us through email : fashion@oikos-international.org or through our Facebook page. We are always happy to hear from ecofashionistas from around the world!