Meet The Businesswoman Leading Change in the Fashion Industry By Championing Culture And Tradition
Our throwaway society, and its addiction to fast fashion, are responsible for devastating environmental destruction across the globe. Each year, billions of garments are made worldwide using cheap industrial textiles, with masses ending up in landfills. Without significant change, the destruction caused by the fast fashion industry is set to rise year on year. One brand is leading change in the way industries use textiles, with beautiful bespoke fabrics.
Koua Studio is a textile brand championing change. Founded by visionary force Erika Alvarez in 2021, Koua Studio creates recycled, organic, and deluxe textiles with a positive environmental and social impact. Designed to advocate creativity, innovation, and tradition, the company provides fashion and interior design industries the chance to make more environmentally and socially conscious choices.
Their exciting new project unites fashion designers with Mexican artisans, by simplifying the collaboration process between the two. The goal of the project is to promote the cultural heritage of the Mexican people, by preserving their traditional techniques and cultural practices. Other social benefits of the project include poverty reduction through job creation and female empowerment.
At the heart of the project is a circular initiative, where Koua Studio textiles are used to re-work worn garments and deadstock, saving them from landfill, and instilling them with a new identity and lease of life. In crediting the indigenous community with the creation of the textiles, Alvarez is connecting the consumer to the lives, and stories of the craftspeople. The resulting garments represent more than a beautiful piece of clothing, but an embodiment of a collaboration between culture, innovation, and tradition.
Alvarez is on the hunt for fashion designers – who are passionate about sustainability, and the preservation of tradition – to join her mission in creating garments that interweave beautiful storytelling with expert craftsmanship. She’s also keen to collaborate with fashion brands, who are looking to revive their deadstock to create new pieces with the bespoke Koua Studio textiles.
Alvarez says “I believe that collaboration is a key for growth. If we join our talents we can create abundance for all and a positive impact on the environment and society. I want to make an impact on my people’s life, the artisans. Specially on women who are socially more in disadvantage. At the same time I want to contribute to slow down the fast fashion wave connecting designers with a beautiful and transparent production process, encouraging them to use our textiles for their collections. This is the mark I want to leave in the world.”
To find out more about Koua Studios visit: https://www.kouastudio.com or follow on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/erialvarezz/.
Pieces from the project can be shopped via the Instagram shop https://www.instagram.com/reel/CfMBKLYq6Da/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=