DuPont™ Sorona® highlights the human side of sustainable fashion
“I made your clothes,” is the saying on the signs that the women in the Taipei Awakening Association (TAA) proudly display as they thank the DuPont™ Sorona brand team for letting them showcase their skills and expertise in garment design and manufacturing. At the DuPont™ Sorona® brand Slow Food, Slow Fashion event held on September 11th on Angel Island, California, garments made with some of the latest Sorona® fabric technology ranged from casual ready-to-wear pants to a chic and sophisticated skirt and ended with the perfect stretch lightweight jacket that any fitness enthusiastic would want to wear to the and from the gym. These runway garments not only test the versatility of the latest collaboration fabrics launching from DuPont but they were fabricated by the nonprofit organization Taipei Awakening Association (TAA) demonstrating their versatility and professionalism in garment making.
Since the TAA was founded in 1994, “women helping women" has been the core mantra for the organization. Women from all backgrounds can join as members with the end goal of improving their professional skills to enter, or reenter, the workplace as well as regain confidence and hope. The TAA has developed a business model for social enterprise management, providing a variety of training courses to offering as much assistance as possible to enhance each woman’s ability to positively contribute to society.
As part of the TAA, they have very talented women with great expertise in garment making. After learning about the TAA DuPont approached the TAA to make these garments to help demonstrate another way that fashion, environmental sustainability and social responsibility can go hand in hand. The overarching objective of the TAA is to create a sustainable cycle of employment opportunities for these women, and the DuPont™ Sorona® brand is a great example of that in action.
“When we explore new opportunities for partnerships that will develop innovative solutions, delivering on both high performance and sustainability in apparel, we also want the values of our partners to align,” said Kiki Chen, Sorona Marketing Manager Taiwan, DuPont Industrial Biosciences. “The involvement of the Taipei Awakening Association, is a great example of how that alignment can create incredible results. The human and socio-economic impact that sustainability has all over the world is often overlooked when considering sustainability in fashion. Through this partnership, we could highlight how helping people through opportunity can go hand in hand with environmentally-conscious efforts. What we showcased at the Slow Food, Slow Fashion event this September was so much more than garments.”
“This collaboration offered performance and sustainability to [our] organization as [our partners] provided great expertise in the garment making,” said Susan Wu, Project Manager, Taipei Awakening Association. “Our members have the [background] in textiles but are either single mothers or re-entering the job market and need more confidence to show their ability by creating more opportunity for them. Working with TAA not only enables us to have the high-quality garment sample [but], at the same time, we are doing something good for [our] society. TAA shares the same principles as DuPont™ Sorona® as we focus on environmental stewardship and social responsibility. Fashion, environmental sustainability and social responsibility can and should go hand in hand.”
