Then back to the UK for Estethica at London Fashion Week.  The show got off to a great start for us with an order from Japan on the Thursday, before it even officially opened!   Again, we found a very high level of interest from Japanese customers and it was great to see the Japanese buyers back at London Fashion Week again as, in recent years, many buyers have favoured Paris Fashion Week over London.  Other new stockists for 2012 will include the fabulous Mezzo Mezzo boutique in Corfu Town.

After the success of our collection in Paris and London, we managed to obtain a last-minute stand at The Box as we felt that the new collection had such good momentum that we should show it to some more customers.  Very excited to now have a stockist in St Barths, French West Indies, as well as several new customers in France and more Japanese stores.

Although I wasn't able to go to Paris for the entire show, my 15 year old daughter Sienna and I headed off to Paris on Friday afternoon for the weekend.  As temperatures soared, we were happy to be showing at The Box in the beautiful Pavillon Cambon, rather than in the nearby Tuileries where the temperatures in the tents were unbearable.

Sienna and I walked various shows: Première Classe, Zip Zone, Atmosphère and caught up with some of our favourite ethical designers such as Ada Zanditon, Beautiful Soul and, our neighbours from London Fashion Week, Lost Property London.  All were having a good show which was very encouraging to hear.

As we were staying with friends in St. Ouen, whereas to visit on a Sunday morning in Paris than the famous Marché Puces de St Ouen flea market which, incredibly after so many weeks spent staying in the area over the years, I had never visited on a Sunday.  Had I known that the flea market also contained vintage clothing shops, I may have visited a little sooner!  For those who aren't acquainted with the St. Ouen flea market, the name is probably a little misleading as the area has very little of the bric-a-brac normally associated with this type of market.  Instead, you can admire the most incredible antique shops specialising in different époques and merchandise: a shop filled with copper pans (my husband's favourite); lighting from huge glass chandeliers to anglepoise lamps of every shape and size; art deco furniture; antique maps and, our favourite of course, clothing.

This was vintage clothing of the ilk that is very rarely seen in vintage shops, certainly not in the many vintage stores in London which I trawl regularly for '50s dresses.  These flea market stores were specialising in the highest designer fashions and there was something incongruous but quite refreshing about seeing names like Alexander McQueen, Galliano, Dior, Vera Wang, written on scraps of paper in black marker pen and affixed to the garments, bags, shoes and jewellery on display.  

Oh how we wished to be the American women in those stores, accompanied by their husbands who we suspected would not blink at the prices and their wives would emerge with a vintage prize.  Unfortunately for us, we were on a budget, and a tight one at that.  Sienna was hunting for a vintage dress to wear to her prom next year and fell completely in love with a fabulous, floor-length, figure-hugging beaded Versace haute couture gown.  Undoubtedly a snip at 2000Euros, it certainly wasn't coming home with us.  She still sighs in a longing manner whenever I mention the flea market and I suspect that I am bringing her up to have expensive tastes.  She was hunting in Waitrose for foie gras this afternoon for goodness sake!

And so I return, sad to leave Paris but very excited at what the year ahead holds for Pachacuti.  This year has been a difficult one for most ethical clothing brands and I was concerned at what next year would hold, particularly given the poor weather we have experienced which I think has affected our sales more than the recession.  However, they always say that in a recession you should concentrate on building your exports and, with over 90% of orders from these trade shows coming from new overseas customers, that seems to be exactly what we are doing.  Now if only I could find an excuse to personally visit them all...

Timeless style is the key to Pachacuti’s collections this year: designs which look good not just from season to season, but from decade to decade. Styles with longevity made from quality fabrics, wool felt and alpaca, which contribute to a more sustainable design aesthetic.

Pachacuti’s inspiration for our Autumn/Winter 2011 Felt Hat collection is drawn from the classic hat style of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall.

Many people associate South American traditional dress with the bowler hat, worn by women throughout the Andes.  However, with the wearing of felt hats in decline amongst indigenous communities as they rapidly adopt western dress, many hatters are shutting up shop. 

In the village where we work there used to be twenty workshops when I first visited in the early '90s and now only a few remain.

Pachacuti is developing new styles of felt hats in order to give the artisans an outlet for their traditional skills and preserve this important aspect of Andean textile heritage.  Our felt hat orders represent an important source of income for this small family workshop and, as our orders grow every year, we hope that they may soon start to expand as a result of increased production.  This season you can also find a selection of Pachacuti Panama hats on Net-à-Porter

Pachacuti’s inspiration for our Autumn/Winter 2011 alpaca collection comes from quirky and curious finds from heirloom knitting patterns.

Our autumnal colour palette is taken from scrumping for apples and damsons in neighbours’ gardens.

Alpaca is a true luxury and sustainable fibre. This hooded shawl is made from the softest, most luxurious baby alpaca yarn. This incredible fibre naturally repels the odours and stains of city life, meaning that alpaca garments need very little washing which further adds to their eco-credentials.

Alpaca is one of the most sustainable fibres available: the animals graze freely high in the Andes and cause barely any damage to native vegetation. Moreover, the fibre doesn’t bobble or pill and stays looking good for an estimated 10 years.

Pachacuti is the first company in the world to be Fair Trade Certified by the World Fair Trade Organisation, a guarantee of the highest social and environmental standards throughout the supply chain.

I am in Ecuador for a few weeks, the main purpose of my trip being to explain to our Panama hat producers all of the intricate details entailed in the production of our 2012 collection.  It is our most ambitious to date, but our weavers love working on new patterns and we have already discovered that they weave our coloured panama hats faster than the equivalent hat in a natural colour!

My first few days were based in Otavalo, from where I could travel out to the villages to see our embroiderers, tailors and felt hat makers.  I had come prepared to work on embroidery designs as I had learnt two months ago when visiting our embroidery group that high cotton prices meant that most buyers were either taking their designs to cheaper countries, or converting to machine embroidery.

Our embroidery group, who are based about an hour north of Otavalo on a remote mountainside, had been the first of our producer groups to receive glasses and cataract operations two years ago and I was keen to hear how they were progressing.  However,  Mathilda who co-ordinates all of our embroidery, told me about her latest visits to see the group. "Every time I visit" she explained "the embroiderers ask if there are any orders from Pachacuti due to the higher Fair Trade prices paid.  If there are no orders, they would rather earn money picking tree tomatoes as the market price for their skills is so low". Realising what a huge responsibility this creates for Pachacuti, I returned to my hotel and spent the entire weekend working on embroidery designs for a dress and a blouse in black cotton, so that at least we can place orders to sell in our shop over the Autumn period. 

Ecuadorian cotton wears and washes so well and we get a lot of repeat customers in our shop, yet the embroidered blouses are often more of an afterthought for me after designing our hats, so I left the area with new resolve to create more embroidery designs each year so that these traditional skills do not die out. 

My designs are usually based on traditional Ecuadorian embroideries, updated with different elements; I may include the odd motif from Mexican embroidery, or take some influence from '50s design.  Mathilda will carefully copy out my designs onto the sleeves and yolks of garments and take these to the embroiderers, collect them a week later and sew them into the garments. 

I think the photograph below shows exactly what we are trying to do at Pachacuti: Mathilda sitting at her sewing machine with her field of maize and vegetables outside the window.  The family are almost self-sufficient from their land, only purchasing essentials such as flour and rice from the local shop.

As traditional dress continues to westernise and buyers seek cheaper alternatives, these skills could be lost within a generation or two.  The region's boom days of the early '90s when everyone was exporting Ecuadorian wool jumpers, coincided with the men in the area converting to jeans and trainers instead of white trousers and alpargatas and ditching their traditional felt hat, keeping only their long plait as a symbol of indigenous identity.  Will women's dress follow this same fate?  At present almost all indigenous women in the area continue to wear traditional dress, which includes highly embroidered blouses.  Although not a pre-colonial textile art in the Andes, embroidery has been practiced in this region since it was imported by the Spanish in the 16th Century and was rapidly incorporated into traditional dress.

I'd always felt that we were playing our small part in preserving the traditional textile heritage of the Andes, but hearing that the embroiderers would rather earn money picking tree tomatoes than embroidering, unless that embroidery happened to come from Pachacuti, makes me realise what an incredible responsibility I have to the people and culture of this region.

I arrived at the V&A with my husband & Pachacuti Marketing Manager, Mark Rogers, and Doraliz Aranda, Production Manager.  One of the first people I spotted, unmissable in her fuscia Pachacuti fedora, was Pamela Ravasio, Pachacuti's Press & Marketing Officer, who was independently up for an award for her blog Shirahime.

After champagne and socialising, the awards commenced.  The panel was composed of 32 judges who included actor Colin Firth, TV presenter Ben Fogle, Deborah Meaden from Dragon's Den and model Lily Cole.  I was delighted to hear Livia Firth, battling laryngitis, announce Greg Valerio as the winner of the Global Campaigner category.  Greg pioneered Fairtrade gold which was launched this year and worn by Livia Firth on the red carpet at the Oscars.  Read more on Livia's Vogue blog.

Other winners announced were Compassion in World Farming in the Campaigner category, with Bill Oddie accepting the award; the People's Supermarket, who were presented their award by Colin Firth; The Co-operative Group won the Ethical Business category and we were delighted when it was announced by Baroness Lola Young that Pamela had won the ethical blog award.  Before the awards started, Mark and I had been walking on the Pavegen paving slabs which turn the energy from footsteps into electricity and their win in the Big Idea category was extremely well-deserved.

Finally, it was time for the Fashion & Accessories category and T4 presenter Rick Edwards, together with Vogue fashion features editor Jessica Bumpus, took to the stage.  This is always one of the most hotly contested of all categories and we were up against strong competition: Veja with their ecological footwear made from sustainable Amazonian rubber and organic cotton and Christopher Raeburn, a designer who re-uses parachute silk and military fabrics in his collections.

Winning this award is such a fantastic accolade for Pachacuti's work in pioneering Fair Trade Fashion since 1992.  I am delighted that the eminent panel of judges appreciated the hard work which my wonderful team based in Ashbourne, Derbyshire, and I have put into in continuing to push the standards higher in the field of ethical fashion.  Pachacuti became the first company in the world to be Fair Trade Certified by the WFTO and we are now piloting an EU project on Geotraceability: the Geo Fair Trade Project. I am delighted to receive this award in recognition of the hard work which my staff and I have put into creating a Fair Trade, sustainable supply chain for our Panama hats, clothing and accessories and the innumerable benefits which this has brought to our producers and their communities in the Andes.  I can't wait to visit our producer groups in Ecuador this week and tell them about this exciting award.

The final award of the night is the Lifetime Achievement Award, won previously by Sir David Attenborough and last year by Gordon Roddick, pictured with me left.  It was Anita who initially inspired me to set up Pachacuti after reading her autobiography and thinking that if she could revolutionise the beauty industry with no experience in that field, there was nothing to stop me from trying to do the same within the fashion industry. 

This year the Lifetime Achievement Award was won by scientist and originator of the Gaia hypothesis, James Lovelock.   His pioneering model is the foundation of climate science today.

I had a wonderful evening at the awards and later at the after party where we continued to drink champagne into the early hours, exchanging stories with the Observer Food Editor about our respective visits to El Bulli.

The Observer Awards recognise those companies who make ethical living more accessible and achievable and this year's award winners do exactly that, from ensuring you can buy an ethical gold wedding ring to delivering weekly veg boxes or campaigning against mega-dairies.  It is a real honour for Pachacuti to be an award winner this year alongside so many other incredible campaigners and ethical pioneers

On my trip from the airport to my hotel, I was astonished at the greenery of the city and equally surprised by my ability to hold a conversation with my driver in Portuguese after listening to a dozen last-minute podcasts before departure, although my Spanish already provides a good basis for the language.  My room on the 23rd floor of the Rio Othon Copacabana had incredible views over the beach and Sugar Loaf mountain and a few caipirinhas were definitely called for sitting in the beach bars at night watching the sun set. 

I knew that I was speaking on the first day of the conference and arrived at the hotel at 8am expecting to find information for me about the venue and timetable as nothing had been provided beforehand.  However, there was no information at the hotel.  I finally received a phone call telling me that a car was outside, waited a further half hour for the car to actually materialise, then arrived at the conference centre to find I was on stage immediately I walked through the door!  

The Fair Trade fair was fairly small, but the quality of the exhibitors was high and there was an interesting range of products from Fair Trade honey and coffee, through to clothing, jewellery and accessories.  On my second day at the fair, I was excited to discover some fascinators made from recycled fabric scraps and recycled bottle tops.  After a lot of persuasion, I finally managed to convince the exhibitor to take me to the workshop in the favelas of Rio where the recently formed group met twice a week in order to make recycled fascinators to supplement their income.  

A taxi dropped us off in the equivalent of the central reservation of the M25.  When we eventually made it across the many lanes of fast moving traffic, I was so excited to discover that the next leg of my journey was to be on the back of a motorbike.  It was the best experience I'd had in a long time, whizzing through the backstreets of the favela, no helmet, on the back of a motorbike taxi.  The women's group making the fascinators were based in a small room up an alleyway and were so friendly that it immediately made me hope that their product sells as I would love to come back here.

  I rummaged through bags of scraps on the floor and eventually sorted out four different seasonal combinations of fabric remnants, to add to the base of the fascinators which are made from recycled bottle top rings wrapped with embroidery thread.  Explaining all of the specifications was stretching my limited language knowledge to the maximum, but my Portuguese improved considerably in those few hours, although I still can't remember the translation for the colour grey.

After the three day conference was over, I moved to the Guesthouse Bianca in Santa Teresa, a rather bohemian area of Rio, halfway up a hillside and connected to the centre of town by old trams.  The accommodation was fantastic, with my own balcony overlooking Sugar Loaf Mountain and a kitchen to make tea.  The nearby restaurant Espírito Santo specialises in fish and seafood and my Tilapia wrapped in collard greens in a banana sauce was some of the best fish I've ever eaten.

Although intending to have a weekend off to explore the city, work impinged on free time, so ended up with two half days.  The first I spent ascending Sugar Loaf Mountain by cable car.  The day was overcast, but not sufficiently to impede the views and the benefit was that there were no queues and I was at the front of each cable car as I ascended and descended.  Walking around the forest at the top of the mountain, I sat for a while on a bench watching the marmosets jumping through the trees above my head. 

My second half day was spent at the Ipanema Hippy Market which I had not envisaged attending due to the name but was told on Sunday morning that the quality of the craftsmanship at the market is extremely high.  I am a notoriously picky shopper and very rarely buy anything, but came back from my morning in Ipanema with 3 leather belts, a pair of green sandals, a recycled necklace made from vintage gold coloured buttons and the obligatory pair of Havaianas for my daughter.  The morning finished with an hour sitting at the end of Ipanema beach, cold beer in hand, listening to Cath Kidston on Desert Island Discs.

Rio surprised me as a city: I just hadn't envisaged how green it would be and also how low-rise in comparison to other Latin American cities.  It is a very easy city in which to spend time and I hope very much to return soon… I just need to sell some recycled fascinators first!

This afternoon I arrived in Ecuador at our Panama hat association after a gruelling 30 hour journey via Amsterdam, Bonaire, Guayaquil and Quito.  The road from Cuenca down to the village where our hat weaving association is based is always a dangerous one due to treacherous mountainous Z-bends and the propensity of drivers to overtake with insufficient visibility.  Last time I took this 1 1/2 hour journey we were held up for half an hour by an accident and this was no exception: one truck crash blocking the road and a police car which had lost a wheel!

Since last year, my trips have been made imeasurably more pleasant by the construction of a beautiful Eco Lodge, a 10 minute walk along the river from our weavers. Hosteria El Barranco nestles in the hillside overlooking the rio Santa Barbara and the Andes mountains beyond and is a tranquil retreat where I can work, as well as having the occasional opportunity to enjoy the pool and steam room.

Learning to weave a Panama hat

Wednesday 6 April

This trip to Ecuador was only finalised a week before I left.  Our Panama hat weaving association is one of the pilots for the Geo Fairtrade Project, a 3 year EU project which will provide visible accountability of sustainable provenance, both for raw materials and production processes using technologies which rely on different remote sensing imagery.  The social, economic an environmental indicators collected will increase transparency throughout the supply chain, from the community plantations where the straw is organically cultivated through to the rural communities where our hats are woven.  As the only non-food pilot, our work in gathering data on handicraft production will be vital in ensuring that the indicators work both for food producers and for production within the fashion supply chain.

Although an intern had spent 4 months collecting data in Ecuador, there was still a considerable amount of missing data.  Although it could be perceived that our commercial interest could compromise the validity of the data, we believed that the long-standing trust and transparency we have with our association, coupled with understanding of production processes, would allow us to collect accurate data.  

My day was spent researching the geographical, environmental, social and economic data which has already been collected and trying to work out where the gaps are in data collection.

The Cuenca region has particularly high levels of migration and, as a result of talking to our weavers this afternoon, I learnt that there are now 7 women to every man in this area.  Statistics show that this has had a devestating effect on the chidren of this region, 60% of whom have one or both parents living overseas, with a suicide rate twice the national average and increased alcohol, drugs and truancy problems.

Thursday 7 April

As a result of the pressure put on families in this area by absent fathers, children are leaving school early in order to help support their families.  In theory the minimum working age is 15 and educational is compulsory until 17, but in interviews we have found that many of our weavers' children have left school around the age of 13.  Part of the problem is the lack of schools in this region and many children enroll in distance learning programmes.

However, working children in the area are being assisted by our Panama hat association who administer a series of grants within the region, one aimed directly at working children and providing $110 a year to keep 172 children age 7-18 in education.  The management of our weaving association give both their time and their premises to be used in administering these grants and twice a week children come to receive education in values, maths and language skills.

Today we also conducted a long overdue experiment into the time it takes to weave a grade 2 panama hat, stopping the clock whenever the weaver took a break.  In questionnaires with an intern for the Geo Fairtrade project, the weavers had claimed an average time of 18 hours which we doubted as there are so many distractions within their homes: agriculture, animals, children, elderly relatives.   We carried out a time trial with two weavers making different hats, one plain and one patterned.  The average time taken over two days to prepare the straw and weave a hat was 9 hours 23 minutes, around half the time previously indicated!  This data is extremely important in order to ascertain how many hours a week the weavers work and calculate their average wage per hour.  

8 April 

We called in a representative group of members of our weaving association today in order to collect data for the Geo Fairtrade project and also for our certification under the Sustainable Fair Trade Management System as we have to conduct a baseline assessment of producers every 3 years and 2011 is an assessment year.

We started the morning by asking the weavers a selection of questions ranging from the time it takes them to reach the nearest primary health care facility (only 45% of weavers' houses are accessible by car and many have a long walk to the nearest road where they can catch a bus or hitch a ride in the back of a pickup) to detailed questions about their cost of living.  I think the most surprising result was with regard to clothing purchased during the year.  Almost all of the weavers started by saying "la ropa dura", or "clothing lasts" and many spent no money at all on an annual basis on their clothes, so different to our fast-fashion culture.

We then moved on to the baseline assessment and I decided to ask the same questions as three years ago in order to measure the change in % of the weavers' responses.  Three years ago the association was headed by a tough and, it appears in retrospect, disliked President who in 2009 left the association together with the secretary and sued them for $10,000 in unpaid social security which she herself was responsible for paying.  

We try to keep this activity simple using sad, happy and neutral faces in different colours, but always find that there are a few members who can't follow this and almost the only sad face collected in each question was consistently given in by the same elderly weaver, possibly just because she liked the colour pink!

The difference in the responses was astonishing in some cases: 

Volume of orders from Pachacuti: 2008 63% not happy, now 73% are happy and the rest are neutral.

Health: 2008 almost everyone unhappy but now almost all neutral.

Pay: 69% were happy and 25% neutral which were not dissimilar to the figures 3 years ago

Relationship with the management: 2008 the majority were neutral whereas now they are happy.

Saturday 9th April

It's Saturday, but I have such a busy schedule that I have to work all day analysing and measuring the data collected so far.  However, there is always time for a swim and relaxation in the eucalyptus-scented steam room.

Sunday 10th April

The torrential rain during the night must have infiltrated my sleep as I dreamt of floods and awoke to find the river below had burst its banks and was a coffee-coloured raging torrent, carrying away trees and a considerable number of animals who had been left grazing overnight on the banks.  A farmer down the road has lost 20 cows which represents over $10,000 in lost income, a fortune in this impoverished region.

Market day on Sunday is also the day when all of the weavers in the surrounding area come to receive payment for the hats they have woven during the week, both the weavers of our association who come to their community shop and for the rest of the weavers who are at the mercy of the whims of the intermediaries.  Interviewing a few weavers who were selling to the middlemen, I was astonished that they knew the measurements they should weave in terms of crown height, width and brim, but none of them mentioned the grade of the hat as a means of measuring their pay.  Considering a fine weave grade 8 is purchase by our association at around 3 times the price of a grade 2 and taking into account weavers' poor numeracy skills, it is clear how the intermediaries are taking advantage of them.  Watching the intermediaries at work, they barely glance at the hat and offer a price, or reject the hat completely.

By contrast, we visited our association where a long queue of weavers from the 150 members were waiting to turn in the fruits of the week's labours.  It was interesting to see not only the significant difference in price paid, but also how the President and Treasurer were giving clear feedback to the weavers, pointing out all of the green fibres and faults in the weave or measurement which meant that they may not be receiving the full price for that hat.  Despite being in the Panama hat business for 19 years, this is the first time I realised the difference in purchasing by the association, not just in terms of price but in acceptance of hats with streaks of green fibres.  These fibres later have to be painstakingly removed from the weave of the hat and replaced with a natural coloured fibre: a long and difficult job.

Back to the hotel for a delicious bar-b-q lunch with the President and Production Manager of our Panama hat association, discussing how to improve quality.  Decided to rent the convention room in our hotel for a morning this week and convene all of the co-ordinators from the surrounding communities in order to give a talk on the quality issues we are facing and also to give a presentation on good working practice to improve the health of the weavers.

Monday 11th April

Probably not the right morning to work from the hotel in order to prepare for the baseline assessment with our hat weavers and our other hat co-op, felt hat producers and embroiderers.  Below me is unfolding a beauty pageant to find the most attractive teacher in the area, complete with flower-strewn catwalk between the two pools, accompanied by loud music.  However, the benefits of staying here have been that I have been able to sit out in the sun, indeed it is the first time in a week I have even seen the sun!  We are fully in the middle of rainy season here in the highlands and I am so pleased that the sun shone today as the wonderful team of brothers who run this EcoLodge have worked so hard to put on this function.  I'm looking forward to a swim in the balloon filled pool when the guests have departed!

A new addition to our collection was our range of Carry On bags: made from recycled plastic bags.  Of course, our bags are not just recycled but are also Fair Trade, made by the Women's Hope collective in Colombia.  More about this exciting new collection to follow in the next post.

I always enjoy being part of Estethica at London Fashion Week, alongside other pioneers of ethical fashion such as From Somewhere and Junky Styling and newcomers who bring fresh perspectives and innovative materials, such as Jacob James STINGplus caps made from a blend of nettles and wool.

Surprisingly, the only Fair Trade representation at Estethica this season was the Fairtrade Foundation, showing their new collection of Fairtrade cotton scarves designed by the Fairtrade Collective and on sale at ASOS, and Pachacuti.

On the first day I was visited by Livia Firth who is such a fantastic and tireless eco-advocate.  She managed to squeeze in an afternoon at Estethica to visit all of her favourite ethical brands before flying off to the Oscars where The Kings Speech won Best Picture and Colin won a well-deserved Best Actor.

On Saturday, Estethica hosted the brunch which, as usual, boasted a few trays of canapés and copious amounts of champagne!  The venue was crowded with press, buyers and visitors and the whole day was extremely busy for us.  My beautiful daughter, Sienna, arrived at the end of the brunch and stayed for the next four days, dividing her time between getting snapped by photographers in the courtyard of Somerset House and helping me on the stand.

We had a successful London Fashion Week with orders from UK and overseas buyers and leads for some exciting designer collaborations which are under discussion as I write.  At the end of Tuesday, thanks to my friend Amanda King, Sienna and I secured tickets to Ashish, the last show of the season.  Sequinned punk tartan mixed with jumpers which looked as if they had been pulled out of a moth-filled closet: a wonderfully tongue-in-cheek way to end London Fashion Week.

Two days back in Ashbourne, a weekend in Brussels (touring Art Nouveau houses and talking about the Sustainable Fair Trade Management System) and then it was time for Paris Fashion Week and a last-minute stand at Zipzone.   Zipzone is curated by Alessandra Stretti and takes place in two locations on the rue Rivoli.  Pachacuti was located at 111 rue Rivoli at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, which also happens to house my favourite bookshop in the world.

Finally, taking a breath and enjoying being back at home in the Staffordshire Moorlands, far away from the world of fashion.  Riding our pony Billy over the hills on chilly, sunny mornings and enjoying the annual Shrovetide football game which takes place in Ashbourne.  The entire town is closed and shops boarded up for two days, so a great opportunity to be outside and meeting up with friends who I so rarely get to see due to my hectic lifestyle. 

It was a very different kind of fashion on show at Shrovetide: hoodies, wellies and jeans (apart from me, wearing a thick, knitted Betty Jackson skirt under which I can pile on thermal leggings and wooly tights) but nice to get back to the real world for a fleeting moment, before my head is buried again in designing our 2012 collection next week.

Rubber is one of the most important products to come from the Brazilian rainforest. The rubber boom of the mid 19th Century was centred on the Amazon and forms an important part of the country's social and economic history.

Although the indigenous peoples of the forest had been extracting latex from rubber trees for many generations, it was only in 1839 when Charles Goodyear discovered the process of vulcanisation that the white latex sap was able to be transformed into an industrial product.  The collapse of the rubber boom was caused by an act of bio-piracy by British explorer Henry Wickham who, in 1876, smuggled 70,000 rubber seeds out of Brazil to Kew Gardens in London.  The seeds were raised at Kew and then distributed to the British colonies.  By 1940 rubber exports from Brazil were almost non-existent.

Maguari is a role-model riverside community in the Brazilian Amazon who are dedicated to defending land ownership rights and promoting the sustainable use of rainforest resources.   The community are extracting latex from the native rubber trees abundant in the region but underutilised since the days of the rubber boom.  

Latex comes from the sap of the Hevea Brasiliensis and is obtained by making diagonal cuts in the bark from which the latex drips into a container.   The latex can be combined with natural pigments and used to paint bags and clothing.  Maguari and other Amazonian communities create sheets of latex backed with natural cotton which can then be made into bags, tablecloths or other accessories.  

The cotton is stretched over a wooden frame and the latex mixture is then painted onto the canvas.  It is then taken to a traditional brick kin where the frame is passed over the smoke several times until the sheet turns yellow.  The sheets of latex are then put in a kiln for two days until they turn dark brown in colour, hence the term 'ecological leather' being frequently used for natural latex production.  This natural cotton cloth covered in latex was originally used by the indigenous population of the rainforest to protect their provisions from the constant rainfall in the region.

It is estimated that 63,000 families in the Amazon forest earn their living from rubber tapping in extractive reserves which cover up to 1% of the forest  The Poloprobio project is just one production unit out of 28 which have already been set up by the organisation in the states of Acre, Amazonas, Pará, and Rondônia.  

I purchased a '50s style bottle green make-up bag and a pair of black rubber sandals which I ended up living in for the remaining 10 days of our holiday.   They are the most comfortable sandals I have ever worn and I'm wishing I had bought a few pairs as will undoubtedly live in them all summer.  

According to Royal Correspondent Sarah Hughes, when Prince Charles toured the community a few years ago "he was presented with a rather fetching rubber sun-hat but seemed a little reluctant to part with his panama".  Can't say I blame him!

Our guide, Madoo, was reputedly the best on the island and so, undeterred by the early evening drizzle, we set off through the mangrove-lined waterways to find the star of the show: the Scarlet Ibis. The Scarlet Ibis begins its life as a relatively drab grey and white bird, but its diet of red mangrove tree crabs slowly turns it a spectacular vivid scarlet.

Unusually for me given my poor observational skills, I spotted a snake hanging out in a tree in one of our forays into a small side creek. 

As dusk started to fall, we waited across the lagoon opposite a large island where the first of the Scarlet Ibis came in to roost for the night. There were already plenty of blue and white herons coming in to roost on the same island. Over the next half hour, the sky filled with small flocks of Ibis, usually around 6 to 12 in a group, all landing on the same tree-covered island. 

Eventually the entire island looked very seasonal, like a gigantic Christmas Tree covered in red baubles!  

Pre-colombian gold jewellery and ornaments from the Zenu culture, as well as the Taironas and Muiscas have been found in Colombia dating back over 2000 years.  Walking through a heavy bank vault style security door, I first came to a display of Sinú gold, including a delightful gold jaguar, together with anklets, bracelets and coverings for more intimate parts of the body.   Other body adornments on display were ceramic rollers which would have been painted with natural pigments and rolled onto the skin to create body art.

The gold from the Zenú culture focussed on fish and marine birds and animals as the culture was based around a series of canals which they built around 500BC which supported the civilisation with fish and fertile sediment for agriculture.  Amongst my favourite exhibits on display was the collection of gold fishing hooks and the line of spoonbills.

The next day we had booked 4 hours horse-riding a 30 mile bus ride away in Cahuita.  Cahuita is on the Caribbean coast with black sand, palm-fringed beaches and, beyond the palms, a lush coastal rainforest.  Trails lead from the beach into the rainforest where sloths fill the trees and the sound of howler monkeys fills the air.

When asked if I was an experienced rider, I probably wouldn't have said 'yes' if I had known that I would be given a very fresh 3 year old to ride, particularly with no hard hat.  If I am planning to go riding, I normally travel with riding gear, but this was a last-minute decision.  The idea of galloping across extensive sandy beaches was enticing , but I hadn't reckoned on a bucking, skittish horse, combined with the hardest saddle I have ever sat on.   We spent a good hour cantering and galloping, with my horse dashing in and out of the waves and bucking for joy. With a rope bridle which had no bit, I had very little control. 

Torrential rain started an hour or so in to the ride and we all got completely drenched.  My new ebay Prada 'raincoat' turned out not to be fit-for-purpose, unless that purpose is running from a shop across the pavement to a taxi, as I was soaked to the skin within minutes.  The guide seemed keen to gallop back as quickly as possible, despite me saying that I would rather trot back regardless of the rain.  I was concerned about getting bucked off, particularly as I was only one week into a five week trip, the longest 'holiday' from work I have managed in the last 20 years.

I ride every week at home, but after this ride I had some really serious bruising and it was not a riding experience I would want to repeat.  Riding along the sands and into the rainforest was undoubtedly beautiful, but the horses, tack and management of the ride were definitely not of the standard I would expect.

After a delicious fish soup in Cahuita, Mark and I were glad of a break in the rain to explore the Cahuita National Park.  The National Park is a biological corridor which extends to over 100 hectares of virgin forest.  Just a stone's throw from the sea, the sandy path led us through a forest teeming with creatures.  Sloths were everywhere and we had seen a few mothers with babies whilst riding, but our first sighting was of a sloth right next to us on the path who very very slowly crept away down the tree into the cover of the undergrowth.  A couple of capuchin monkeys were playing in the trees and underneath, well disguised on a branch, was a snake with a big  egg-sized lump half way down its body - dinner.  Then at the very furthest extremity of the tip-top branch of a tree we spied an iguana.  He was certainly getting the sun up there but I'm not sure how he was planning to get down.  Howler monkeys made their presence known vocally, but were too far away to sight.

Then the rains returned and we ran dripping to the bus stop, sat soggy and sore for the hour's bus ride back to Puerto Limon and side-stepped muddy lakes in the road and splashing vehicles to arrive sodden and squelchy back at the boat.

It has been 15 years since I last spent time visiting the Mayan sites of Central America - an eventful trip which ended up with me being shipwrecked off the reefs in Belize at almost 7 months pregnant.  I was hoping that this trip would prove just as fascinating but a little less eventful!  I spent months studying the Maya as part of my MA in Native American Studies 20 years ago and was surprised to find that I could still interpret some of the glyphs at the sites we visited and recall the names of the Mayan gods.

The first site I visited was Uxmal (pronounced Oosh-mahl) in the Yucatan area of Mexico.  Uxmal was home to around 25,000 people at its height during the Late Classic period (600-950AD) and was the regional capital of the Puuc region.  Uxmal means built three times and we saw evidence of this in our first few minutes of exploration.  The site was almost deserted when we arrived, before the mid-morning influx of tour groups.  After admiring the impressive 100 foot high House of the Magician, we clambered up the back of the pyramid into a very narrow, humid, dark raised corridor, probably unseen by the majority of tourist who visit the site.  Inside the few foot wide corridor were magnificent carvings of serpents and latticework, illuminated only by the light of our mobile phones.  The Maya would build a new temple on top of existing temples and this thin slit was a gap between one layer of the pyramid and the stage of construction.

On to Lamanai in Belize, whose name means 'submerged crocodile' in Maya.  On our boat trip to the ruins, we did indeed see a small crocodile who swam off his log as the was from the boat reached him.  We arrived in Lamanai via an hour long minibus ride and then a further hour in a speedboat up the river, with the helmsman stopping at times to show us birds and animals on the riverbanks, such as the Jesus Christ bird which appears to walk on water, but actually walks on the waterlillies which spread along the banks.

There is evidence that Lamanai was occupied as an agricultural settlement as early as 1600BC, with building commencing around 700BC.  The site rose to regional prominence in the pre-Classic period from around 4BC and remained in occupation until the 17th Century, even staging a successful rebellion and driving out the Spaniards who established churches there.  Unlike many Mayan sites which were excavated by archeologists such as Stephens & Catherwood in the late 19th Century, work on Lamanai only began 35 years ago and it is estimated that only 5% of the buildings have been uncovered.

We climbed the main temple at Lamanai, a short, yet very steep climb to the highest point in the region with fantastic views over the jungle, accompanied by the constant noise of howler monkeys in the surrounding jungle.

Our last Mayan site was Copán in Honduras, a site I had visited previously but which was so impressive that I decided it was worth the 10 hour return bus trip to see again.  Copán lies near to the Guatemalan border and my last trip was a two day bus ride over unpaved roads from the Guatemalan side.  Copán was the Mayan capital of the region and was occupied for over 2000 years from Early pre-Classic to post-Classic periods, with around 25,000 inhabitants in the valley at its height.  The city was abandoned when the Spaniards arrived there and it is presumed that exhaustion of resources in the region or disease were responsible for its decline.

We had barely long enough to climb the pyramids, explore the tunnels, visit the numerous stelae and marvel at the 2200 glyphs on the Hieroglyphic Stairway which forms the longest Mayan hieroglyphic text in existence.  The sculpture museum had been built since my last visit so we decided that we hadn't come all this way to spend an hour eating lunch, so we left the rest of our tour and it was well worth spending the time to see the impressive collection of architecture housed in the museum, includinge a replica of the Rosalila temple with painted stucco exterior as it would have looked at the time.  A short tuk-tuk ride to the restaurant and we even had time for a quick lunch of delicious tacos, chicken, guacamole and refried beans, before the long bus ride back to Puerto Cortez.

Visiting, and in some cases revisiting, these Mayan sites has undoubtedly been the highlight of my trip so far. It has reminded me of many of the reasons why I fell in love with this region so many years ago and decided to spend my life working to help preserve Latin America indigenous culture and skills.

Mr Cable said that capitalism must adapt its model to ensure a more prosperous, stable future. The hallmarks of responsible capitalism included taking the long-term view; strong leadership and good management; investing in staff and displaying ethical behaviour.  

He talked about the perils of short-termism and gave examples of companies who aligned their long term economic interests with those of their employees, including JCB in Rocester who are based just down the road from Pachacuti's Ashbourne shop and office.

In conclusion, Vince Cable came to examples of good ethical behaviour "While Derbyshire-based Pachacuti, which I'm told does a rather fetching line in Panama hats, is the first in the world to be certified against the Fair Trade Sustainable Management System, which guarantees living wages to everyone working in the supply chain."  Other examples of good ethics included Tata Consultancy, Thomson Reuters and Café Direct. 

My last journey to Guatemala, Honduras and Belize was when I was 6 months pregnant with my daughter, travelling for 2 days over a cobblestone road to reach the ruins of Copan.  That journey ended rather eventfully in a shipwreck and almost going into labour on the plane back to the UK.  If you haven't read this story, it's on my blog entry The Accidental Mumpreneur 

After 20 years of travelling to Latin America on a regular basis for work, I feel like it is time to fall in love with the continent again, its culture and its people and rediscover the real reason I set up Pachacuti.  I spent most of the time on my MA in Native American Studies working with PhD students (I was the only person on my Masters!) who were researching the Mayan glyphs and I'm really excited to have the chance to do some research into these areas again as part of our trip on Voyages of Discovery.  We'll be visiting the ruins of Chitchen Itza, Copan and Tikal.  Or at least I will, I'm not sure I'll be able to drag Mark away from the fantastic snorkelling opportunities off the coast of Central America.   The cruise is accompanied by a programme of lectures.  I did offer my services, but Voyages of Discovery had already filled all of the lecture posts for the trip.

From Cuba, where there is a Latin American Handicraft Fair taking place, we travel to Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Belize and then to Cartagena where there is a Fashion, Accessories and Art fair on the day I arrive.  Next it's two days in Venezuela.  It's 19 years since I was last in Venezuela and I'm sorry to say that I had a really bad experience both of the country and of the men in particular, so I'm hoping that this trip will help to change my opinion of what I'm sure is a wonderful country.  Next, it's cruising up the Orinoco, then Devil's Island and up the Amazon, before finishing off with several ports of call down the coast of Brazil.  I'm particularly looking forward to travelling up the Orinoco as when I was working in Venezuela in 1991 helping to write cruising guides to the Caribbean, I was offered a fantastic job on a luxury yacht sailing up to the source of the Orinoco.  I turned it down as thought that working on the cruising guides would be a good combination of sailing on a classic yacht and more academic work, but it turned out to be the most dreadful nightmare and I jumped ship about a month later.

I think my problem is going to be luggage allowance as I want to bring about 10 kilos of books to keep me going for 34 days: The Latin American Fashion Reader, several books about the pre-colonial architecture of the meso-American region, as well as a novel or two.  I'm looking forward to re-reading two books which inspired me when I was sailing in South America and the Caribbean 20 years ago: Tristes Tropiques by Claude Levi-Strauss and The Saddest Pleasure by Moritz Thomsen. 

In addition, I'm hoping that the trip will prove an inspiration for designing my 2012 Panama Hat collection, so sketch books and pens will also need to be brought in my luggage.  Added to this, I'm planning to pick up the samples for our exciting new recycled, Fair Trade bag collection when I'm in Cartagena at the end of December.

I'm hoping to blog from the various ports of call as long as I can get WiFi, so look out for the journal of my Latin American Odyssey coming up from mid-December!

For years it has frustrated me that every time I return from working in Ecuador, I invariably get asked "how was your holiday?".  Spending time with our producers in Ecuador is really hard work, frequently frustrating, long days and rarely a day off.

However, the real delight of our last trip to Ecuador in October was discovering a new Eco-lodge just a short walk along the river from one of our principal producers.  To put this in perspective, we normally visited these producers every day from Cuenca, the nearest town, usually driven the 3 hour return trip on precipitous zigzaggy mountain roads by a daredevil driver.  After being held up for half an hour on our first day driving to our producers by a nasty accident blocking this notoriously dangerous road, I was relieved to have booked into a newly-opened Eco Lodge for the next two nights.

Those two nights gradually extended into six nights as we enjoyed our leisurely morning riverside walk to work and returned to a swim and sauna in the evenings. Unaccustomed luxury compared to our usual trips! The Hosteria Barranco in Sigsig is $20 for a single and $40 for a double

I had booked a hotel in the old city for a change, just over a block from the Presidential Palace.  Little did I realise that I had booked a ringside seat for the action which was to follow!  

We left our hotel to walk around the area to look for hat ribbon suppliers located nearby, taking in a church or two on the way.  We were accompanied by our hotel manager who offered to show us where the ribbon suppliers were located and, as we walked, he was telling us to be careful as there were no police on the streets today due to a strike.  After about half an hour walking around shops, including the Sinchi Sacha Fair Trade shop located next to San Francisco church, shopowners started to pull down their shutters.  The next shop we went into warned us to go back to the hotel as armed robbers were on the streets, looting and robbing shops and banks as there was no police on the streets to apprehend them.

Barricaded in the hotel, the drama unfurled on the TV screen in front of us, with the President stranded in hospital and an armed battle carrying on outside as police tried to storm the hospital with the intention of killing the President.  By the evening, hunger had got the better of us and Mark was disappointed to find that all of his top restaurant research had been in vain as all of the restaurants had closed for the night due to security fears.  Fortunately, the rooftop restaurant a block from our hotel had remained open and seemed fairly safe as it was at the top of a high building.  After finishing our meal on the rooftop terrace, we stopped briefly to watch the live action of the coup attempt on TV in the restaurant bar.  A gun battle was raging at the hospital as police were still attempting to get to the President.

Suddenly someone ran in and told us that the President was in the Plaza of the Presidential Palace, just a block away.  He had escaped from the hospital in disguise in a wheelchair. We had come out without valuables and so decided to take the risk and ran over to the square to see the President give a long and impassioned speech.  The square was filling with more and more people as news of his escape spread: singing, flag waving and a fiesta-like atmosphere were a dramatic change from the gun-battles we had been witnessing on the television moments before.  However, I was aware of the strong military presence in the square and also concerned about what would happen when the police discovered the President had escaped.  Would they be heading our way?  We headed back to the safety of our hotel and hoped that we would be able to travel to Otavalo the following day.  The Panamerican Highway had been blocked by burning tyres and we weren't sure what the situation would be the following day.   A State of Emergency was declared throughout the country and borders were closed with neighbouring countries, but the next day everything seemed to have reverted to normal.

I have to say that the events of 30 September were not a huge shock to me.   On my first ever day in Ecuador in 1990 I had to run away from police throwing tear gas.  I was in the country during the Ecuador-Peru war in 1995; I have witnessed numerous road blocks due to protests and had to take circuitous 8 hour journeys over cobbled roads to undertake journeys which would normally have taken 2 hours; I've seen 8 presidents come and go in Ecuador in the past 13 years, all of whom were elected for 4 year terms.  The difference with this coup attempt is that the President has retained the broad support of the electorate and the coup was orchestrated by a small, rogue group of disillusioned police.  However, the fact that this coup attempt even took place points to how fragile democracy remains in this region.  I am still astonished that the police would attempt to kill a President who has the support of the people over the issue of a cut in their bonuses and taking away their Christmas basket. 

For now, the Ecuadorian flags are stored away… at least until the next coup attempt.

This has been a year of change, of questioning, and we need to find ways to tackle the problems we have encountered.  Sustainability and Fair Trade have moved to the forefront as  valid solutions. Alpaca is one of the most sustainable fibres available: the animals graze freely high in the Andes; the fibre doesn't bobble or pill; natural resin resists stains and odours; needs little washing; looks good for an estimated 10 years. Wrap yourself in reassuringly warm, soft alpaca as an antidote to city life.

I know that our customers increasingly want to be informed of the provenance of the garments and accessories you purchase, seeking a link to the artisan and an assurance of high ethical standards.  Pachacuti is the first company in the world to be Fair Trade Certified by the World Fair Trade Organisation, a guarantee of the highest social and environmental standards throughout the supply chain.

All accessories shown are 100% alpaca, handmade by co-operatives in Peru and Bolivia.

Extra long hooded baby alpaca shawl  - dust       £117
Twenties flower hat - teal                                    £23.50
Thistle fingerless alpaca gloves - granite             £29.95
Rambling rose scarf - teal/berry                          £59.95

Photo: With Livia Firth, Colin Firth's wife, at London Fashion Week after receiving my award.

It has the potential to be a business which is easy to run and profitable, but the supply chain for the school uniforms needs to be re-established with fairtrade, organic producers. I would love to get the warehouse clear of the many boxes of stock we still have as I am paying monthly storage for school uniform we will never get around to selling.  So if anyone out there is interested in a new business, please let me know! Please email: carry(at)panamas.co.uk

In August 2010 Pachacuti was Highly Commended in the International category of the National Awards for Excellence for our impact on Millennium Development Goals.  However, many individuals, businesses and world leaders are not doing as much as they could to ensure that we achieve these targets within the next five years.  This is why the Fashion FT100 has been collecting signatures to urge world leaders to act now.  

Fair Trade is at a disadvantage, competing with conventional fashion companies on an uneven playing field. This is because conventional companies don’t pay close to the living wage or work to sustainable environmental standards. If we wait for policy to change, the MDG’s will never be achieved in time.

The petition called upon  world leaders at the MDG conference in New York to:
1.        Drop the duty on Fair Trade fashion imports
2.        Give Fair Trade fashion organisations financial and technical assistance
3.        Procure Fair Trade clothing and textile products for the Public Sector

Ben Ramsden from Pants to Poverty and creator of the record-breaking World's Biggest Pants which you can see in the photo, took approximately 2000 signed petitions to the UN MDG summit in New York.

At the end of next week I will be back in Ecuador, meeting with all of my producers and hearing at first hand the difference Fair Trade makes.   It is not just the payment of a fair wage which makes a difference, but regular work which fits in with their agricultural cycles, training, improved health and safety, better education for their children and sustainable environmental practices.  Fair Trade impacts on so many of the Millennium Development Goals and makes a tangible impact on poverty reduction.

As a finalist in the Green category of the Mumpreneur Awards I started wondering how I became an accidental Mumpreneur

I didn't ever plan to be a Mumpreneur.  Firstly, I didn't ever plan to run my own business and secondly I didn't intend to have children… so how did this happen to me!

Pachacuti really was an accident - it was only meant to be a research trip for my MA.   I met two groups of workers who had organised themselves into co-operatives, but both had experienced arson attacks due to the threat which they posed to the intermediaries' monopoly of the supply chain.  Outraged by these clear injustices, I decided to return to Ecuador in order to provide a sales outlet for these groups who were unable to trade locally.  My intention was to sell the knitwear over the summer before starting my fully-funded PhD in Andean textiles.  However, I hadn't envisaged the success of my first collection, nor realised the positive impact it would have on my producers' livelihoods, so at the end of the summer I reluctantly turned down my PhD.

In 1996 I found I was pregnant but carried on working and travelling.  To be honest, I'd never thought of having a child and had never even held a baby until I was 9 months pregnant.
                                                                Sienna on  holiday in France last week
At 7 months pregnant I was sailing off the coast of Belize when we were shipwrecked on a reef near a deserted island.   After making it to shore in the middle of the night, on an island known for its poisonous spiders, we were eventually rescued a day later by the Guatemalan Navy.  After a  scan at a Guatemalan clinic to check the baby was ok and the news I was expecting a boy, I made the long journey back to Colombia to take a flight back to the UK, technically now after the latest travel date for pregnant women. 

Half an hour into the flight I felt contractions.  I called a stewardess and of course the plane became rather a commotion once everyone realised that someone was potentially going into labour on their flight!  Fortunately there was a midwife on the flight who rubbed a tub of Vicks into my stomach and made my walk up and down the corridors for hours  which seemed to do the trick and I made it home without further incident.

My daughter was born at a stage when the business was making very little profit and I was having to pay back the debts resulting from a large theft in Ecuador at the inception of the business (but this is another story… armed robber, death threats - it was an eventful time!) 

I was back to work immediately, taking her to a festival where I was trading at just 12 days old and slinging a hammock up for her beneath rails of clothing!

A year later I was a single mother, working a 70 hour week and juggling childminders and nursery. My daughter accompanied me on my trips to South America from the age of one until she started school.  Working was not financially viable at this time due to childcare costs, but I had more than my own daughter to think about as I already had hundreds of women and their children reliant on my trade, so giving up was unthinkable.

Eighteen years since starting Pachacuti, I have a wonderful, beautiful teenage daughter and more recently a fantastic husband and part-time American stepson.  Work/life balance has undoubtedly got easier over the years as the business has grown and I've been able to afford to take on more staff and take more time off work.  That's not to say that I don't still work incredibly long hours, but I do now succeed in taking a week off with my family in the Summer Holidays, although this is something I have only managed to achieve recently in the past two years.

Yes, of course I regret not having more time with my daughter when she was younger.  I used to pick her up from childcare at 6pm every day and I frequently worked over the weekends when she was younger as well.  I was drawing no money from the business, so no treats or holidays for years.  I could't afford to buy anything new for Sienna when she was born and relied on hand-me-downs from friends for years to keep her in clothes and toys.  However, I know that the impact Pachacuti has had on the lives and families of 1200 producers has been so significant and this could not have been achieved without some level of sacrifice.  I may not have had as much time as I would have liked with my daughter throughout her childhood, but through the rural work programmes we have created in the Andes, hundreds of women are able to earn a good income working from home, caring for their families, instead of migrating to towns and cities in search of work.  

In the area where we weave our hats, 60% of schoolchildren have one or both parents overseas which is indicative of the poverty and the huge migration away from rural communities.  Alcoholism, truancy and suicide rates have soared amongst teenagers with absent parents in these communities and this is why the work we are creating is so important.   Not only are we providing income and social support for home-working mothers, but we are keeping families and communities together. 

And at the end of the day, despite the inevitable guilt which goes with being an entrepreneurial mother, I've been told at numerous parents' evenings throughout my daughter's education that she is the happiest, most well-balanced child they have come across…and happy children make happy families!

The feature includes interviews with myself and Orlsola da Castro, co-founder of From Somewhere and curator of Estethica, the ethical section of London Fashion Week http://www.fromsomewhere.co.uk/ and Dr Kate Fletcher, author of a book which I can highly recommend on Sustainable Fashion and Textiles http://www.katefletcher.com/

You can read the whole article online here: http://www.greennatgeo.co.uk/

Pages 32 to 39

Hail Mary Queen of Shops: here are my top five tiny independent stores

Having reversed the fortunes of small fashion boutiques and charity shops, Mary Portas's new series on BBC2 that begins tonight focuses on the plight of the small independent shop -- the baker and the off licence and the deli. I hate shopping in supermarkets: they lure you in with free parking and cheap food, and you always end up spending  £400 on stuff you know will go off before you can eat it. Huge chains like Topshop merely make my head spin. As Mary says in the show tonight, unless we patronise small stores they will disappear from our high streets. Here is my top five ... do feel free to add your favourite local shops

1. Palette London, 21 Canonbury Lane, London N1(020 7288 7428).

This small boutique has the most wonderful collection of vintage fashion from Ossie Clark, Oscar de la Renta, Halston, Chanel et al. The 1970s Guccis is wonderful, as are the bags, shoes and jewellery. The owner is very knowledgeable. Keira Knightley is a fan

2. Pachacuti (above right) is at 19 Dig Street, Ashbourne in Derbyshire (01335 300 003). Don't let the fact it is fair trade and organic put you off: there is delicious knitwear from alpaca wool, Panama hats and a large range of children's wear. A friendly, family run shop in a beautiful part of the world

3. The Dulverton Delicatessen,  Somerset. This is my local food shop, and although I am not one for eating or cooking, this shop, run by the beautiful and knowledgable Emily, might well convert me. Local cheeses, juices, cakes, bread and vegetables, as well as the sort of unusual ingredients you expect only to find in London. Emily will order anything you fancy, from vegan cheese to eco friendly  firelighters

4. Atelier Abigail Ahern (below), 137 Upper Street, London N1 (0207 354 8181). This is an Aladdin's cave of good taste: finds from Paris flea pits, exquisite chandeliers made from porcelain by local artisans, lamps, candles, Rastafarian floor cushions

5. Mee, 9A Bartlett Street, Bath (01225 442250). Heidi Klein swimwear, trinkets for the home -- a bestseller is a king size velvet throw for £195 --  silk jersey draped dresses by New York designer Yoana Baraschi, a red carpet range of dresses by David Meister. What is different about this lovely little boutique -- Vanessa Paradis is a fan -- is that the sales assistants offer a really personal service, and will spend a lot of time making sure you choose exactly the right outfit 

As part of Pachacuti's Fair Trade Certification, every year, together with each producer group, Pachacuti creates an annual action plan that allows producers to direct how Fair Trade will benefit them the most. In 2008 one embroidery group all complained of poor eyesight. In Spring 2009, we paid for eye tests, glasses and eye operations for the 20 workers who required them, totalling $800.

After the success of this project, Pachacuti approached  our co-operative of women Panama hat weavers based in Ecuador and enquired if the 300+ weavers might need glasses. The answer was a resounding YES. 

The women live in a poor, rural region of Southern Ecuador and rely on the weaving of hats as their primary source of income. This traditional skill is demanding work and requires good eyesight to produce quality hats.  To remedy this situation Pachacuti and the Co-operative decided to make the purchasing of glasses for the weavers their primary goal for their 2010 Fair Trade Action Plan.

Pachacuti arranged for eye exams to be given to the weavers and it was determined just over 200 of the women required glasses, with 65 weavers being prioritised as needing glasses urgently. This was beyond the financial means of Pachacuti and the co-operative to purchase.  It was with the help of a group of Ashbourne residents that the Sunglasses for Glasses concept was born as a means to achieve the funding for this project. It is our hope that, through the involvement of area school children, we can together raise the money needed for the purchase of the glasses whilst providing an opportunity for the children to learn about global issues and empathy for others.

Sunglasses for Glasses day last week raised enough money for over 30 pairs of glasses, so we are well on our way to our target!  A huge thank you to the schools and children who took part and  I'm looking forward to posting some photographs of our weavers with their new glasses!

It was a truly inspiring evening for myself and my staff.  After champagne and canapes, Mandy Yound of Adrenaline Alley in Corby took to the stage.  She told of how she set up the extreme sports park in response to an attack on her son when he was carrying his skateboard.  What started as a small skatepark has turned into the biggest extreme sports centre in the world outside of the US - all run as a Social Enterprise.

After Dinner and the presentation of the Community Impact Awards, Michelle Feeney, CEO of St Tropez, talked about Mac cosmetics.  Michelle used to work for Estee Lauder and, when the company bought Mac, she became their head of Global Communications.  I had no idea at all that all profits from Mac Viva Glam go to the Mac Aids Fund.  It sounds like a truly impressive company and convinced me to linger a little longer next time I pass a Mac Cosmetics counter!

Finally it was time for our Award, the last category award of the night.  Our video looked fantastic on the big screen, showcasing our work on the Sustainable Fair Trade Management System through video and photography with an actor's voiceover. 

We were certainly the smallest of all of the companies receiving awards last night, with other winners including Rolls Royce, Experian, Northern Foods and East Midlands Airport.  However, I think it is so important to show that a small, East Midlands company can not only have a huge impact locally (and we do work closely with our local schools and community) but can have a significant impact Internationally.  I think that the important element of our work on the Sustainable Fair Trade Management System is not just the impact on our 1000 or so producers, but the real development potential which the system offers to small organisations and companies throughout the world as a means of addressing Millenium Development Goals.

We were delighted to receive our Big Tick Award and are excited about the forthcoming National Awards for Excellence on 5 July.

Moreover, we have been shortlisted as an Example of Excellence in the International category for our work towards Millenium Development Goals and helping to create a replicable model for international development through the SFTMS.   The overall Example of Excellence in the International Category will be presented by Prince Charles on 5th July.  Pachacuti is running alongside Barclays Bank, Thomson Reuter and Cisco Systems for this coveted award.

The Awards for Excellence reward businesses who demonstrate the positive impact they have had on society and also the business benefits created by ensuring that being responsible is integral to their business model.

We are delighted that our Panama hats which are woven for Pachacuti by weavers in remote areas of the Ecuadorian highlands are now for sale at a Pop-Up shop in Liberty.  These women have very few opportunities open to them: many are single mothers or wives of alcoholic husbands and they are reliant on income from agriculture and hat weaving.  Many are forced to migrate to cities in search of low paid domestic work, leaving behind their culture and their community.

I believe that this is fantastic example of how opportunities can be created for marginalised producers if they are better organised, resourced and supported through the work of Fair Trade.  Pachacuti's producer groups are now able to secure access to one of the most prestigious stores in London under fair trade conditions, providing them with a decent and dignified livelihood.

Having sold Panama hats for the past 18 years, I thought that it was high time I really put one through its paces on an action-filled safari holiday in Kenya.

Having read on ehow , the website which tells you 'how to do just about anything' that a Panama Hat was the ideal hat to take on Safari, I decided to take a Pachacuti fedora llano weave grade 8 on a 4x4 and horseriding safari in Kenya (although evidently I didn’t wear a panama when riding!) We clearly couldn’t have a Panama hat style called the African Queen without taking it to Africa, so this style was delegated to my 13 year old daughter Sienna to wear.

Our safari holiday was with Tharua Safaris, a family run business based in the Kenyan highlands, sandwiched between the Solio and Ol Pejeta game reserves, both home to the rare black rhino.  Ol Pejeta is situated between the foot hills of the Aberdares and snowcapped Mount Kenya and before leaving for the safari I had seen it listed as the top destination for Eco Safaris.

We arrived at a time of endless rains at the end of a two year drought – great for Kenyan farmers but not so good for riding horses in the exceedingly slippery red mud.  Still, we persevered with a steady ride on the first day and discovered that the weather was deceptive.  As there was almost complete cloud cover, we set off on a three hour ride with a low factor suncream on.  

Obviously I should have realised from two decades of travelling in the Andes that I should use a high factor suncream at altitude the thin air allows more UV to reach the skin.  However, I wasn't aware that the foothills around Mount Kenya were that high but it materialised on my return that we were, in fact, at 2000 metres altitude and, of course, we got burnt.   Fortunately we had riding hats on, but they still don’t shield your face very effectively.

Due to the rains, a decision was made by Martin and Tiddy to travel north to the Mpala reserve where there was apparently no rain, although we would have to travel by 4x4 instead of on horseback.  I didn't realise at the time what an incredible privilege this was. The Mpala Wildlife Foundation operates a biodiversity conservation research center, a 48,000 acre wildlife conservancy and a variety of community health and outreach programs in Laikipia.  At present the reserve is only open to researchers but, as our guides were friends of the reserve manager, we were able to visit the reserve as invited guests.  More to follow in my next blog post about the safari, game drives and animals spotted, included hippos in the river below our tent and an elephant in the campsite!

I hadn't expected the Panama hats to be so well used.  After all, I had intended to be wearing a riding hat a lot of the time!  Standing up in the jeep with our heads out of the roof for several hours a day, the Panamas were invaluable.  We had an early morning game drive, returned for breakfast, drove out again for about three hours for a picnic lunch, then back for a cup of tea and out again for an evening drive.  Even heading out in the late afternoon, the sun was fierce.

I was surprised at how well my Panama hat stayed on, considering it was fairly breezy and we were travelling at quite a speed sometimes on very rough and bumpy dirt tracks.  Although I did put a hand up to ensure my hat stayed on a couple of times in the wind, most of the time I felt very confident that my hat would stay firmly on my head without flying off into the path of a passing giraffe.  

I was even more surprised at my daughter's pronouncement of how great her African Queen Panama was in the sun.  She really dislikes the heat and the extra wide brim of the African Queen provided excellent sun coverage but was still stylish enough for a fashion-conscious teenager to wear - even if there was no-one around for miles to see her!

Anita Roddick built an empire on skincare but still reminded people that "The most effective anti-ageing product is a sun hat." So, next time you go on holiday, please remember what Anita Roddick said and take a hat with you, preferably a Fair Trade Pachacuti Panama hat.

You can see the whole Emma Watson for People Tree range on the People Tree website where you can read the story behind Emma Watson's collaboration with People Tree, as well as see images and videos from the photoshoot such as the one below.

Emma says that this collection is important because “It's fabulous, colourful, comfy, summery and everything you could want in your summer wardrobe. And it's not made using nasty chemicals', it's not going to damage the environment and it's not going to make anyone sick or ill. And it's Fair Trade so you are actively helping someone who is living in poor conditions, by buying these clothes you are changing someone's life. It's a really feel good thing to wear. You can feel good about yourself as you will look great and be changing lives.”

The Women on their Way Awards were set up by former candidate on The Apprentice, Jo Cameron, and her Co-Director Lisa Ibbotson. The aim of Women on Their Way is to inspire women around the world to improve their lives, moving towards equality.

I am really passionate about women's training and development, both in developing countries and within the UK.  For the past eighteen years I have been working to improve women's skills, training and personal development in the Andean Region of South America, paying for courses from pattern cutting and IT skills through to self-esteem and leadership. Over the years I have taken numerous staff, designers and intern students from the UK out to South America to improve Quality Control, business organisation and technical ability and to give talks on health and safety and environmental responsibility.

I have had several student interns working at Pachacuti, usually from Derby University, but also from as far afield as France and Ecuador. It is always rewarding to take the students out to South America and usually an eye-opening experience for them as they realise the very real limitations of working with Fair Trade producers, particularly in terms of available raw materials.  Most of them have gone on to incorporate designs developed with Pachacuti into their final collections.   It is very rewarding to see some of those students go on to set up their own ethical fashion businesses; that's exactly what I want to achieve.

In  the past few years I have taken on roles including Enterprise UK Ambassador, University of Essex Alumna of the Year 2009, East Midlands Ambassador and Business Language Champion.  These entail working with educational institutions from secondary schools to Universities, giving presentations ranging from sustainability and ethical fashion through to business skills and the importance of learning languages. In addition, over the past year I have travelled as far afield as Nepal, Madrid and Ecuador to give presentations on Pachacuti's Fair Trade, Sustainable certification by WFTO.

The 10 judges for the Women on their Way Awards include Gill Fielding from The Wealth Company and Caroline Marsh of Channel 4 Secret Millionaire.   The winner will be announce on Friday 19th March at the annual Women on their Way Awards lunch at Aston Villa Football Club.

This week I spent two wonderful days in Paris and have come back to the UK feeling refreshed and stimulated.  On the first day I went to Modamont, the trimmings show, and was really impressed to find several European family companies producing hat ribbon and able to custom-make quantities as small as 100m with our own stripes, colours and prints.  I also visited L'Aiguille en Fete (The Needle Festival) Pro, an international trade show dedicated to textile crafts.

The following day I had booked a textile tour of Paris as part of L'Aiguille en Fete.  Our day started at the Quai Branly Museum Cafe where Françoise Cousin (Doctor in ethnology, curator and in charge for many years of the textile collections of the Quai Branly Museum) explained how the Museum built its magnificent collections.  The museum is located next to the Eiffel Tower and throughout her talk I watched the snow fall through the glass walls of the cafe, completely obscuring the tower at times.

We then had a two hour guided tour through the collections, from the 1000 pleat skirt to, my specialist area, a wonderful collection of textiles from Paracas.

After lunch, we travelled over to the Marais district in the 4th Arondissement to visit the atelier of Claire-Marie Neufville where textile artists involved in the haute couture industry were gathered  to present their work and tell us about the techniques they use.  I talked to Béatrice Meunier (artist), Catherine Jahan (fabric painter), Maïté Tanguy (weaver), Betty de Paris (color specialist) and Corinne Gradis (textile artist).  I bought a beautiful scarf for my mother's birthday from Catherine Jahan in handpainted silk.  I was delighted (and surprised) to discover that she was planning to visit Stoke-on-Trent soon for a designer collaboration with The New English and I'm looking forward to seeing her again soon when she visits me in Staffordshire.

Claude Fauque, author of over 20 textiles books, talked us through the beautiful images in her book La Broderie: Splendeurs, mystères et rituels d'un art universel  Even though my french is fluent, I do wish this book was avaiable in English! Claude is a consultant in museology and specialist in textile history and she explored the significance of embroidery through themes such as decoration, power and religion.

I wish I could spend more days like this!  It inspired me to spend more time carrying out research into South American textiles and also made me realise that some of my collection of Peruvian textiles should probably be in a museum.

A short video showing the journey of our Panama Hats, from the sustainable, organic, community owned plantation which is encouraging biodiversity, through to our co-operatives of women weavers high in the Andes.

The song is by one of the pensioners we support from the co-operative, Zoila German.  We have bought her a pair of glasses, as you can see from the video, and we are currently trying to raise money to buy glasses for a further 65 weavers.

When I arrived in Ecuador to carry out research for my MA in Native American Studies, I never imagined that 20 years later I would be supporting 1200 traditional textile producers throughout the Andean region.  On that first research trip to study textile production, I was shocked to see how the market was controlled by middlemen.  I met two groups of workers who had organised themselves into co-operatives, but both had experienced arson attacks due to the threat which they posed to the intermediaries' monopoly of the supply chain. 

Outraged by these clear injustices, I decided to return to Ecuador in order to provide a sales outlet for these groups who were unable to trade locally.  Knitting was introduced as a means of income by Peace Corps volunteers in the 60s and the market in the Plaza de Ponchos was full of the ubiquitous fair isle jumper with very little design development taking place. Armed with a book on petroglyphs from the Imbabura and Carchi regions, I drew some designs, combined them with natural dyes and hand-fired raku buttons featuring pre-Colombian designs, and my first knitwear collection was born.   My intention was to sell the knitwear at fairs over the summer before starting my fully-funded PhD in Andean textiles.  However, I hadn't envisaged the success of my first collection, nor realised the positive impact it would have on my producers' livelihoods, so at the end of the summer I reluctantly turned down my PhD.

I named my new business Pachacuti, meaning world upside-down in the Quechua language, as it signified my desire to redress the inequalities in the fashion industry through demonstrating that it was possible to run a successful clothing business which benefited the producers and was environmentally sustainable.  The next few months tested my resolve:  the theft of all of my profits and a business loan by an armed robber in Ecuador with a death threat if I pursued him; sterling plummeting on Black Thursday; recession in the UK.  However, I knew that ultimately my work was making a real difference to the groups I had met.  By this stage I was not only working with knitters, but also embroiderers, tailors, weavers, hatters and was making my first forays into what would become our best-selling line, Panama hats.  Geographically, I had begun working with groups in the highlands of Peru and a natural dye project on the Bolivian altiplano. My aim was to take the best of Andean traditional skills, combine with designs appropriate for the western market and ensure adherence to Fair Trade and sustainable business principles.

Although agriculture had been the historic basis of income in the Otavalo region, many people had turned to craft and textile production in order to supplement their household income. In fact, Lynn Meisch (2002) documented that in the mid '90s income from hand-knitted jumpers  brought in more than $15 million a year. The relative prosperity of the region in the '90s led to an increase in disposable income.  Over the course of the decade I saw a growing trend amongst the men to substitute their traje tipico of white trousers, pintuck shirt, alpargata shoes, poncho and felt hat with jeans and a T-shirt, keeping just their long hair as a symbol of indigenous identity. Traditional male dress which has been an indentifying feature in Otavalan ethnicity is becoming archaic, used predominantly for celebrations such as weddings and baptisms. Changes in female dress have been less rapid, but are still noticeable amongst the younger generation.

Otavalo's textile boom came to an end in 2000 due to the introduction of the US dollar as the national currency, leading to higher costs for raw materials and energy, falling tourism and fewer international buyers.  Coupled with the aforementioned decline in the local market, textile producers were left with few outlets for their skills. The challenge for Pachacuti was continue to innovate, creating new markets in Europe, Japan and the US for a line of clothing and accessories which utilised these traditional skills. 

The embroidered blouse is one of the most important aspects of women's dress from the region.  The white cotton blouse has an intricate yolk designs which is traditionally based on floral motifs, but can incorporate animals, birds and other decorative elements. The hand-embroidery can be very fine and women in the area are justifiably proud of their skills.  My challenge was to create a marketable range which could provide the embroiderers with a constant income and which utilised local skills and raw materials (high quality Colombian embroidery threads rather than imported Chinese thread and local lienzo cotton fabric) to their best advantage. I looked towards nature for my design influence and Pachacuti's range of girls' dresses was launched in 2004.  It was an immediate success, being sold by the V&A to accompany their Arts & Crafts exhibition as an example of the contemporary influence of the movement.

Pachacuti is best-known for our range of Panama Hats, from classic to contemporary styles. From the green lawns of Britain to the catwalks of Paris, the Panama Hat is experiencing a resurgence in popularity, having been a quintessential symbol of British summer fashion ever since 1906 when Edward VII rejected formal morning dress in favour a linen suit topped off with a fine Panama hat to attend Glorious Goodwood. Indeed, the classic Panama hat epitomises the idea of slow fashion, a backlash against the disposable fashion of recent years which has seemed frivolous during a time of recession.

The earliest evidence of a Panama hat can be found on a small ceramic figure attributed to the Valdivia culture of Ecuador from 4,000 B.C. As the hat industry flourished in the mid 19th century, so many large companies were formed along with middlemen who operated throughout the supply chain. These intermediaries are known as perros (dogs) due to their unscrupulous purchasing methods.  As a result of this exploitation, hat weaving has been dying out as young women opt for moving to urban centres, usually for low-paid domestic work, rather than remain within their rural communities. 

Pachacuti is the UK’s only Fair Trade hat specialist, working directly with women's co-operatives in southern Ecuador.   With a Pachacuti panama, the women carry out the entire production process from weaving to finishing and they therefore retain more of the final value of the hat.   Moreover, Pachacuti finances a pension scheme, training, capital expenditure, community development projects and health care. Pachacuti's Fair Trade purchasing gives the women a sustainable livelihood, enabling them to stay within their rural communities where they can fit hat weaving around the agricultural cycle and caring for their families.

Panamas are made from native toquilla grass which is harvested sustainably along the coast of Ecuador. In October 2009, I visited the straw growers on a community-owned plantation of 5600 hectares practising organic agriculture and encouraging biodiversity.  The entire processing of the hat uses no harmful chemicals and the mild chemicals used to bleach the hats are filtered through a system of tanks so that water can be constantly re-used in the production process.    When a Panama finally reaches the end of its life after many years of wear, it can be put on the compost heap - a truly sustainable product.

The village of Iluman, north of Otavalo, is known as the Village of Hats and felt hats have been produced here since colonial times. In the 1990s there were over 20 workshops producing felt hats but now just a couple remain.  The classic style worn by men in the region is a narrow-brimmed version of the trilby.  I wanted to create some more distinctive designs which would bring in added value.  Our ladies felt range is all hand-blocked and hand-finished and we also undertake commissions for designs from other retailers.  By paying a good price for our felt hats, we are undoubtedly helping to keep alive one of the last remaining hat workshops in the area.

As a result of our work in pioneering Fair Trade and sustainable business practices, Pachacuti is the first company in the world to be externally audited and awarded new Fair Trade accreditation by  the World Fair Trade Organization (WFTO).  We can now put Fair Trade Certified WFTO Reg 001-2009 UK on all of our product range.  Pachacuti conducts an annual assessment of producer groups which covers all aspects of Fair Trade, not just a fair price but also issues such as training in skills, cultural identity, environmental management, gender issues, trade relations, health and safety.  For instance, on a visit in October 2008, our embroiderers complained of poor vision and we subsequently purchased glasses and paid for eye operations. This year we are hoping to raise money for glasses for all of our hat weavers.

If producers are not well remunerated, traditional textile skills could die out within just a few generations.  My experience has shown that social, welfare, economic and environmental improvements can play a vital part in keeping this cultural heritage alive and vibrant.  Through combining contemporary design with traditional creative techniques which reflect the rich artistic heritage of the Andean region, we will continue to affirm the value and identity of indigenous skills and create a better future for our producers.

Pachacuti is working on a pilot for an exciting and groundbreaking project called the Geo Fair Trade project, to provide Geo-traceability for Fair Trade supply chains.  The project will develop new social, economic and environmental indicators based on geographic data, resulting in transparency and traceability for the whole product chain from the producers to the consumers. One of our partners in Ecuador, a womens' panama hat association, has been selected for this pilot.

An exciting opportunity has arisen for an internship with them for a six month period, or with one of the other five pilots:

Coffee in Minas Gerais state - Brazil
Shea Butter in Burkina Faso
Tea in Uganda
Vanilla in Madagascar
Cashew, coffee, and spices in Kerala state - India

The main focus of the work will be to collate and organise in digital form existing data. The type of data to be collected will include socio-economic and environmental data related to the fair trade activity as well as relevant regional/national data sets. These data will be used to develop a series of Sustainable Development geo-indicators which are currently being selected and for which minimum data set requirements are currently being defined.

In addition, there will be a requirement to collect data in the field using GPS equipment. This is likely to involve the mapping of field parcel boundaries and location of producers.

The placement will be supervised in country by a CIRAD or partner organisation staff member and some time will be spent prior to departure in SIRS/CRA-W to learn more about the techniques and type of data to be collected.

The placement is envisaged to start in March 2010 for a total duration of about 6 months.

The requirements of the placement are to be able to work in remote areas in the tropics with sometimes difficult climatic conditions and basic infrastructure and have some experience in field data collection and database and/or some experience with GIS/GPS. Knowledge of the official language is also required (English in India and Uganda, Portuguese in Brazil, Spanish in Ecuador and French in Burkina Faso and Madagascar).

This offer of training course is addressed to students of master training course or last year of graduation. The student specializations that would fit with this placement are agronomy, rural development studies or geography

A scholarship is offered in each location to cover local cost.

Contacts for more information on the student placement:

Christophe Sannier -+33 320 72 76 66 – christophe.sannier@sirs-fr.com

Dominique Pallet - tel (33) 467615881 – dominique.pallet@cirad.fr

Mathieu Weil – tel (261) (0)327319864 – mathieu.weil@cirad.fr

Juan Manuel MORA REY
Assistant coordinateur des projets Européens
05.62.60.68.88
jm.morarey@gers.cci.fr

Our alpaca accessories are now 50% off so snap up a bargain and stay warm in this snowy weather.

I love alpaca for a winter hat keeps you warm and cosy but is also lightweight.  One of the best reasons for buying alpaca is that it continues to look great for years to come as it contains natural resins which prevent the fibres from ageing. 

The felt fedora is a great choice for a winter hat as it is naturally water-repellent and is great for this drizzly winter weather - no need to have to remember an umbrella every day, just wear your fedora with style!

An audit was carried out by accredited EU auditors, both in the UK and in South America, and Pachacuti has been certified against The Sustainable Fair Trade Management System (SFTMS)  v2.  The certification is for the organisation as an entirety, rather than taking a product by product approach.  It involves a strong environmental management component, as well as a focus on the overall management of the certified organisation including administration, labour issues, production systems and quality control. It will certify that an organisation has a proven set of practices, procedures and processes which demonstrate social, economic and environmental responsibility.

The Sustainable Fair Trade Management System seeks to provide a certification system for Fair Trade organisations and their supply chains which complements FLO, the existing product-based  labelling approach.  FLO's Fairtrade Certification system was designed for commodities and many Fair Trade Organisations such as Pachacuti find that their products are not catered for by the Fairtrade mark.  Pachacuti’s principal raw materials, paja toquilla for making Panama hats and alpaca for clothing and accessories, are not currently certifiable under FLO.

This will be the first Fair Trade certification which looks at an integrated supply chain, rather than just certifying the commodity i.e. cotton.  In terms of garment production, most of the added value is in the design and production of the garment or accessory and it is therefore essential that there is a reputable label which guarantees that cutting, weaving, sewing, knitting, dyeing and finishing all adhere to high Fair Trade and environmental standards. 

We have seen so many We have seen so many improvements since starting work on this certification process 18 months ago. All of our producer groups are really excited to be part of  the first Fair Trade organisation in the world to be certified. We are sure that this certification will lead to increased sales and bring lasting benefit to all of our producers.

Welcome to Pachacuti's new website! We are very excited at the launch of both our new branding and our new website. After almost 18 years pioneering Fair Trade fashion and accessories Pachacuti is recognised as a leader in fusing ethical principles with great design.

We felt it was time to refresh our image so that it better reflected the brand we have become. Our new logo is based on the crown which is not only the ultimate symbol of status, but also confers a legitimacy on the wearer. As Pachacuti is the first organisation in the world to be CERTIFIED FAIR TRADE by the World Fair Trade Organisation UK001-2009, we feel that the crown is a good reflection of our aspirations to set an ethical example to others in the fashion industry.

Pachacuti is named after the term pacha-cuti, meaning world upside- down, rather than being named after the Inca ruler Pachacuti. However, we decided to incorporate the three feathers from the Andean crown as depicted in drawings of Inca Pachacuti by the chronicler Guaman Poma de Ayala so that our logo still reflects the South American roots of our brand.

I hope that you will find our new website much easier to navigate and that you will take time to read about our work in improving the lives and working conditions of our producer groups in South America. We have been on quite a journey this year, but we know that we are going in the right direction by the tangible differences we see when we visit our producers in the Andes. Your purchases not only make such a difference to their quality of life, but help our weavers to retain their dignity and sense of cultural identity. Pachacuti invests a considerable amount of time and money into training with courses ranging from pattern cutting to self-esteem and leadership skills; health and safety such as buying new glasses for all of our embroiderers in 2009 and for our weavers in 2010; improving environmental management and much much more

Thank you for your support for our work. We are looking forward to the start of a new decade, moving forward with our new identity to bring ever increasing benefits to our producer groups in the Andes.

Now a quick turnaround, battling colds, to prepare for Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia trip - leaving Monday.

CNN presenter Zain Verjee filmed at Estethica, London Fashion Week,
wearing our new African Queen Panama hat for SS10.

Here is our stand at Estethica, London Fashion Week. Was delighted
that the two lovely merchandising girls from Liberty loved the Panamas
and said they could really see them working in Liberty...and we'd love
to supply them.

Later in the week, not only Liberty came by, but all the big stores. I was just so overwhelmed that everyone loved our hats. All of the major magazines and newspapers came by and Vogue even rang the office a few days later to request photos. Very exciting times for Pachacuti.

We're off to London Fashion Week to set up our stand at Estethica. Very exciting to be there and apparently we sailed through the vetting process!

We'll be showing our SS10 collection of Panama Hats. Some great colours, from a fuschia 'Cusco' hat to tie in with the South American folkloric influence through to some fabulous checked Panamas, including red houndstooth which I love. It's our strongest collection to date and we're excited to see the reaction of buyers and the press.

Photo: Sienna

Pachacuti Fair Trade Report 2008-9