For ethical and responsible fashion

The fashion industry, like many others, needs to change, to be more responsible, more ethical, more local. It's been obvious for a long time, and this crisis has at least had the merit of putting the subject back at the heart of discussions. Inevitably, we're also questioning our own practices. We'd like to take this opportunity to take you behind the scenes of our production. It all starts with the fabric.

 

Fabrics

Finding the right materials for the garments you've designed is a lengthy process, and requires constant updating. There are thousands of suppliers, each more or less specialized in certain fibers and materials. There are many criteria to take into account: the thickness, fluidity, softness of the fabric... all have a huge influence on how the garment will fall, but also on the composition, origin and manufacturing conditions. 

For 17H10, we make it a point of honor to use only natural materials made in Europe. We want our pants and jackets to fall as beautifully as possible, but also to be comfortable. 

So we went looking for the great drapers, specialists in costumes, and they're in Italy. Wool sheets even have names to indicate superior quality: super 100, super 120, super 130, referring to the fineness of the yarn used. 

As for our linings, they come from Spain, and our buttons from France.

With so many innovations appearing on the market for these raw materials, it's important to be curious, to try things out, and to challenge your partners. But be careful, ecological doesn't always mean quality. We're open and attentive to all these innovations.

The other major issue is traceability! Even if suppliers are obliged to be more and more transparent, it's very complicated to trace the entire fabric manufacturing chain: the origin of the raw material, where and how the yarn is created, and then where and how the material is woven.

 As far as we're concerned, all our materials are certified and labeled, which is the best guarantee of respect for the environment and the animals - the little sheep for our wool.

The difficulty when looking for noble materials like ours is often the minimum quantities - we have to place large orders that sometimes exceed our production capacity, which eliminates many possible partners - and the production time.... For our wools, as they are woven on demand, it takes 3 months, for example.

Once we have the fabrics, we move on to the manufacturing stage. 

 

Manufacturing

Our products are made in Portugal! A country renowned for its textile know-how and respectful, humane working conditions.

Our factory is located in the eastern mountains. It's been a family workshop for several generations. It's always a joy when we go there. We have great respect and affection for our partners there. It's a pleasure to spend time with them, and between 2 meetings, they introduce us to Portuguese culture. We just love it! 

Since the creation of 17H10, we've had two major productions a year: autumn-winter and spring-summer. 

Our challenge on this subject would be to swap these two large annual productions for smaller, more frequent ones. This would enable us to be even more agile, to have less stock and to be able to replenish as and when we need the models and sizes we've sold. 

Achieving highly controlled production, almost on demand, seems to us to be the solution of the future. This certainly implies that brands commit to new processes, but also that factories accept to produce smaller quantities, and that customers learn to be patient. If stocks are smaller, it will sometimes be necessary to wait to receive your size, or even for consumption patterns to move towards pre-ordering: we only produce what is bought. 

Then there's the question of transporting these parts and packing them! 

 

Transport - Packaging

As our collections are produced in Europe, we prefer to ship our products to France to bring our products to France.

And no more cardboard boxes that pile up and boxes within boxes that end up in the garbage can, we only work with recycled paper and cardboard. Çhe result is very simple, monochrome packaging, but we figure if it's good for the planet, you'll forgive us!

We receive our parts in plastic so that they're well protected, but for us it's a problem we haven't solved yet. Fabric covers? But what kind of material? Cotton consumes astronomical quantities of water, so solving one problem raises another. We're not out of the woods yet, but that's what makes it so exciting. Trust us, we're looking! 

 

To conclude

More than ever, we're working to make our brand even more responsible. This involves a CSR commitment plan that includes what we're already doing today, and what we're going to do tomorrow. 

We know that this is what our customers are looking for: a committed brand, noble raw materials, exceptional quality, reasoned production: 100% European, a strong brand DNA. 

And we believe that this crisis will make even more people aware of the urgent need to turn to brands that respect these commitments. That's what keeps us believing and makes us want to hold on!

We want to be part of this generation of brands that will drive the fashion industry forward.

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