Paraíba’s organic colored cotton in the 2020 press

The report “Brasil Eco Fashion Week celebrates the peak and the vocation of sustainability” in Vogue Mexico analyzes the sustainable fashion week held in November 2020. Journalist Maria Belen Archetto highlights some brands that paraded at the event, among them, Natural Cotton Color with its fashion developed based on organic colored cotton from Paraíba. Below, we reproduce an excerpt (the original is in Spanish): 

(…) after arduous research in innovation and technology, Natural Cotton Color found in organic cotton from the State of Paraíba its most precious raw material for its constructions, saving up to 87.5% of water in comparison with conventional methods. Francisca Vieira and Rafael Lemos not only seek a totally sustainable process, but also promote that artisans and embroiderers have a decent salary in one of the poorest states in Brazil. (…) 

“The pieces from the fashion show this year presented, in addition to our history, our textile evolution. We want to narrate the technological evolution of our cotton. Before we only had the knitwear, then we evolved to the plain fabric, the sweatshirt and years later the cotton jacquard. In 2019 we launched our revolutionary Denim, which is colorful, but without dyeing, and next year we will launch pure cotton and silk threads ”, they conclude. 

 

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A special report on the 20 years since the launch of organic colored cotton, the result of research by the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation – Embrapa Cotton, generated a highlight for Natural Cotton Color on the TV Cabo Branco news program (Rede Globo affiliate) “Paraiba Comunidade” with the theme Organic Colored Cotton.

The TV news program anchored by the journalist Hildebrando Neto reported on the expansion of the brand and the show at the 4th edition of Brasil Eco Fashion Week – sustainable fashion week in November 2020, the new show by Emerging Talents Milan in 2021 and the work of handicrafts in the collections.

 

The 25-minute article reported on participation in Brazil Eco Fashion Week, the new collection for the next show at Emerging Talents Milan – during Milan Fashion Week in 2021 – and also highlighted the work of artisans for the brand. 

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Natural Cotton Color was mentioned in three editions of Elle Brazil in 2020. One of them about the textile crisis in Brazil with the report by Pedro Diniz “Finished cotton?“, Where stylists and professionals were interviewed, among them, Francisca Vieira, CEO of Natural Cotton Color, with phrase highlighted in the report.

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Another important piece of news in the media in which Natural Cotton Color was the source: Thiago Andrill’s “Chão de roupa, piso de comida” – approaching how regenerative agriculture links the textile and food industry, restoring the environment and qualifying life of families in the countryside. Below, an excerpt from the report published in Elle Brasil, December / 2020 edition. 

In 1534, the Portuguese implanted here, in Brazil, the hereditary captaincies. The centuries have passed and, according to the 2006 Land Atlas, of the National Institute of Colonization and Agrarian Reform (Incra), 3% of all rural properties in the country are large estates. Little? Not really: the 3% occupy 56.7% of all agricultural land in the country. In other words, the area corresponding to São Paulo and * Paraná belongs to 300 people.

“To speak of regenerative agriculture in Brazil is to touch the need for agrarian and tax reform. With that, the urgency to update the mechanisms of party culture is also highlighted”, says the co-founder of Brazil Eco Fashion Week. “Sustainability needs fiscal incentives, in addition to technology and the private sector. How can the farmer be charged 18% tax on a kilo of cotton? The textile industry in Brazil has become a dinosaur, to the point that we are experiencing a spinning blackout. The textile sector did not invest in machinery, it was preferable to buy yarn from China and put it directly here “, explains Francisca, from Natural Cotton Color. * Paraná is an important textile hub in Brazil. 

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Revista Gama analyzed sustainability in fashion and interviewed Francisca Vieira, CEO of Natural Cotton Color. With the question “Can fashion be sustainable?”, Mariana Payno divides the article into some important topics: alternatives to current production chains, investment in public policies and technology, the logic of consumption, transparency and also accessibility to fashion products. Below, some excerpts from the report. 

“Trends will not lead to a sustainable fashion industry. The legislation will take”, evaluates Alden Wicker, an American journalist specialized in covering the topic and founder of the EcoCult website. “We need transnational agreements and national laws that require information about carbon footprints and transparent reports, that hold companies accountable for what happens throughout their supply chain, that make it more expensive to pollute than not to pollute,” she says, after a year researching fashion production chains around the world. 

“Until that happens, consumer trends and attitudes will not help much.” Ideal public policies would not only bring environmental regulation, but also invest in the development of technologies to make the process more friendly: to create less polluting materials and machinery for production on a smaller scale, for example. And, going further, it would be necessary to prepare workers for this new reality.

“Working with sustainability requires training: either you encourage and train or sustainable fashion will not survive”, defends Francisca Vieira. 

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