Notre Talk 15 with EVERYBODY.WORLD

Last Thursday, December 12, we hosted Iris Alonzo and Carolina Crespo, founders of EVERYBODY.WORLD, as the guests of the fifteenth installment of our Notre Talks series. Based in LA, EVERYBODY.WORLD is an innovative garment manufacturer, pushing to make fashion more sustainable via its 100 percent recycled fabrics, and kinder,gentler, and more humane by paying its employees fair wages.

Notre is now working exclusively with EVERYBODY.WORLD on the production of our private label garments, and we kicked off our partnership with this live interview—hosted by Colbey Reid, Associate Professor and Chairperson of the Fashion Studies department at Columbia College—and the release of our latest private label collection, available in-store now and online shortly.

“When a factory closes, you lose all of that knowledge. We’re talking about people that have been doing this for decades—generations of experience is there. You’re in awe of the skill around you. The wealth of knowledge, that ability to start with a concept and end with a thing, in 24 hours, is extremely powerful. And also to do it in an ethical way where you’re respecting this work in the way it should be respected is very moving.”

— Iris Alonzo on the importance of working with local LA factories

“A huge myth is that anything that’s recycled is good. This is where we roll our eyes—it’s, like, okay, you made a puffer coat out of some water bottles. Guess what? The water bottles are better off as water bottles and being recycled as a water bottles, because now you’ve made it into a puffer coat that no one knows what to do with at the end of its life cycle—which, as far as statistics say, is that you wear it 10 times, and then it ends up in the garbage.”

— Iris Alonzo on popular misconceptions about fashion sustainability.

“When we approach these people, like Delores—she’s got incredible style, she’s so sassy, she’s so cool—or Paloma, the teenager, we want to know what’s the piece that’s missing from their wardrobe. The idea there is, ‘Can we make something that’s missing in the world? Can we not just continue to make more of the same thing that already exists that doesn’t really need to exist? Can we put purpose behind a product?’”

— Iris Alonzo on EVERYBODY.WORLD’s Contributor Collection, designed in collaboration with friends of the brand who earn 10 percent of sales on items they design.