Almost a museum piece: Welcome to the “Slow Fashion Laboratory”!
Pack & Smooch manufactures present-day lifestyle accessories but has its sights firmly set on the future. And nevertheless we still feel at home in the venerable Hamburg Museum for Art and Industry – not only as far as our work is concerned but also when it comes to our philosophy. Three years ago we had the honour of exhibiting some of our products at the “Stylectrical” where clear-cut and minimalistic design by the US company Apple was at the focus of attention. Of course our bags and sleeves were there as well. At the moment, it is not a product but one of our highest priorities has found its way into the museum at Steintorplatz: “Slow Fashion”. As part of the highly recommendable exhibition, “Fast Fashion. The Downsides of Fashion” presents the specially designed “Slow Fashion Laboratory” by displaying alternative materials and workmanship processes. The visitor is given a well-researched and attractively designed overview of ethically acceptable manufacturing and consumption options for fashion and accessories. This exhibition is an absolute must for all those visiting Hamburg.
Merino lamb’s wool as a perfect example for sustainable quality
“Slow Fashion” stands for change towards more respect and a sense of responsibility in the fashion industry. As an umbrella term for the changing awareness and appreciation for the product, its origin and the consumer’s own behaviour, “Slow Fashion” is all about the environmentally friendly manufacturing process and selection of raw materials, sustainable manufacturing, fair trade, where possible choice of a regional origin of the goods with short production chains and transparency – demands to which Pack & Smooch is strongly committed. We are pleased to say that Merino lamb’s wool, one of the main types of material that we use, has been given a place of its own in the exhibition.
Information on the true price of cheap lifestyle products
The “Slow Fashion Laboratory” is a supplement to the exhibition “Fast Fashion. The Downsides of Fashion” which we would like to warmly recommend (it is on until 20th September 2015). “Fast Fashion” describes the production principle at the lower end of the fashion chain where mass-produced goods are manufactured at increasingly lower prices and which are dumped onto the heavily saturated market at increasingly shorter intervals with devastating consequences for mankind and the environment. The exhibition is the first of its kind to give a comprehensive, differentiated and critical analysis of the global circulatory system of fashion and accessories. Unsparingly, the videos, series of photographs, film reports and installations show the dark sides of the cheap fashion industry and in doing so reveal the uninhibited and careless way of consuming fashion. It is the meticulous exposure of current excesses of “Fast Fashion” which really brings home the message how dearly we have to pay for cheaply produced fashion and lifestyle products.
March to 20th September 2015
“Fast Fashion. Die Schattenseiten der Mode” (Fast Fashion. The Downsides of Fashion)
Hamburg Museum for Art and Industry
Steintorplatz, 20099 Hamburg
https://www.mkg-hamburg.de/de/ausstellungen/aktuell/fast-fashion.html