Ch-ch-changes

It is 2011 and Belindabilly is beginning anew. There have been a lot of changes in my own life since the beginning of 2010 and Belindabilly has gone through a lot as well. Many projects were cancelled because of this, that and the other thing; intentions for blog posts were never realized; plans just generally fell through. But it is a new year, and though it is time for reflection, it is also time for forging ahead. I restart with new energy and enthusiasm, new ideas, and new hope (no there is no star-wars themed collection in the works) and a new computer! I hope to bring my art practice and my fashion design closer together, with more of my own fabrics in my clothing and more artful inspiration in my collections. I hope to have fashion shows paired with art openings and new stores carrying both my fashion and my art. But, I'm getting a little ahead of myself.

One of my first steps is to bring my fashion practice a little more in line with my personal values. I try to make sustainable and eco-friendly decisions in my artwork and in my everyday life, so why not in fashion too? Not that Belindabilly wasn't started with sustainability as a tenet of the company, with our organic cotton logo t-shirts from the beginning, and upcycled clothing later, but I need to take bigger steps. I need to think about the impact that every facet and every detail has on our environment. That is why I have moved my website from a decent but lackluster webhost to a small company based out of Portland Oregon called Canvas Dreams - one of the few if not the only web hosting business that actually uses 100% clean energy for their servers. I'm not talking about all the places that pull electricity from the grid and then purchase carbon offsets; that's a step in the right direction, but still part of an outdated inefficient system. The servers at Canvas Dreams, and as far as I know, probably the office, too, is powered by wind energy that comes from a wind farm near their facility. That's real innovation and not only is it a good step for the environment, but they are also showing that wind energy is both viable and efficient.

Which brings me back to Belindabilly. There are many steps I still need to take and a lot of questions that don't yet have an answer, but I want to show that fashion can be eco-friendly without having to look like it is made of potato sacks and soybeans. Not everything that is organic has to be olive drab, and I'm going to prove it.