What is your ethnic, academic and professional background?
I guess I’m Indian but my parents were born in Tanzania and Zanzibar. I studied Geography at the University of Nottingham and then went on to a fast track scheme for local government. Since then I’ve worked on sustainability for local authorities, a university and an engineering institution. Whilst working I’ve gained a postgraduate diploma in Local Government management and a postgraduate certificate in Low Carbon Buildings.
What does your role at the V&A entail?
Everything! I have a multi-site remit to embed sustainability expertise and implement systemic change in museum operations and behaviours. In one day I can be incorporating sustainability requirements into exhibition tenders, organising sustainability-themed learning and development webinars for staff and tracking down travel data to calculate Scope 3 emissions.
What inspired you to act as a catalyst for sustainable practice? Is there a particular story you can share?
At university I was elected as the Students’ Union Environmental & Social Justice Officer and one project I worked on was with the local authority and Local Agenda 21 Partnership. That inspired me to work in the public sector and help people to make positive changes.
Being South Asian, did you face any backlash about this career choice from family, friends or society at large? How did you overcome it?
Not really, although my parents had expected me to become a doctor!
How have you actively changed your daily practice to be more sustainable?
So many things over the years! Most recently, we’ve been using our local refill shop as much as possible. I buy honey from a local beekeeper, we bake our own bread, subscribe to an Oddbox for fruit and veg, purchase renewable electricity for our home and I try to only buy ethically made or second-hand clothes.
Do you feel there is a stigma or lack of understanding of the climate crisis amongst South Asian communities? What do you believe the blockers to be and how would you go about solving the issues?
I think there’s more of a disconnect amongst our communities rather than stigma around the climate crisis.
For example, countries in South Asia are experiencing the impacts of climate change severely and people are suffering – we know this from relatives, stories of floods and droughts and visits ‘back home’. But this isn’t necessarily being connected with behaviours here e.g. car use, home energy efficiency etc.
What have been your greatest successes and learnings?
The power of networks can never be emphasised enough, sustainability is a very collaborative field and learning from/being inspired by others has been one of the biggest motivators for me. Learning to be patient has also been a major lesson, being able to persuade others and waiting for the stars (budget, circumstances etc) to align!
You’ve worked in a really diverse range of sectors within sustainability, what has been a highlight for you?
It’s hard to pin down to one highlight! I loved organising a solar car challenge for primary schools in Richmond upon Thames, organising a ‘green move out’ for students in halls of residence at the University of East London, producing a much more diverse annual conference for CIBSE and have launched the V&A’s first public Sustainability Plan.
What advice would you give to younger generations in relation to sustainability and the environment? Why is it important for them and their future?
If humans are to realign with nature and live in harmony, we need to be taking drastic action. It is everyone’s responsibility and time is limited so younger generations have no choice but to get involved if we want to have a habitable planet!
Can you share one life story which has deeply impacted you?
I found the story of Daniel O’Connor, the founder of WarpIT inspiring. He saw a problem when he worked for a university (huge amounts of perfectly good items being thrown away) and created a solution to help people deal with it. His exchange platform now has over 1000 schools, 1000 charities and over half the University sector in the UK using the service, as well as Councils, the NHS and the private sector plus overseas users.
Is there anything else you’d like to share?
Everyone can make a change. Don’t be afraid to challenge yourself and those around you. And don’t aim too low, we need systemic change, not just fiddling around the edges.
Harnish and Smital are both of Indian descent. Both of their families immigrated to the US in the 80s. Harnish is a Healthcare management consultant by day and Smital is a People and Organizational Management consultant.
What is Bombay Trade Co, how did it come about and what are your main values as a business?
Bombay Trade Co is a platform to allow users to buy and sell, new and pre-loved, South Asian fashion. The idea came to be in 2019 during our wedding shopping experience. We had tons of outfits sitting in our closet that had all been worn once or twice and were just collecting dust. Smital had gone to India to purchase her wedding outfits, while Harnish purchased his from LA, Chicago, and NJ. The process of buying was so difficult and the process to upcycle our current wardrobe was non-existent. We value making the process easy for the buyer and seller and ultimately help us on our mission to reduce textile waste from one of the world’s largest populations.
How does the platform work?
A seller who is interested in listing their outfit would fill out a quick form on our website. We’ll reply via email with shipping instructions, and once you send us the item, we handle the rest! Once we receive the item, we get it professionally cleaned, photographed, and measured to list it on the site for resale. Once the item sells, we’ll send a check to the seller for their portion of the price.
What inspired you to act as a catalyst for sustainable practice? Is there a particular story you can share?
At first this started as a good way to sell clothes and purchase more in a simple and streamlined way, but as we dug deeper we learned more about textile waste. We became so engulfed in the issue that the mission of our business changed from just offering a marketplace to buy and sell, to really trying to minimise the effects of textile waste and fast fashion. We added additional services to contribute to this mission such as responsible recycling clothing, donations, and small business solutions that partner with brick and mortar boutiques to expand their reach and sell more of their inventory to a wider audience.
Being South Asian, did you face any backlash for your sustainable business idea from family, friends or society at large? How did you overcome it?
We certainly did and still do. Circular fashion is becoming more and more normalised in the world, but there is still a stigma in the South Asian community.
We constantly reiterate our value proposition as well as the macro impact textile waste has on the environment.
This is definitely an uphill battle as this “trend” is just about becoming normalised in everyday wear, we have a ways to go to normalise it for ethnic or fancy wear – but we’re up for the challenge!
How have you actively changed your daily practice to be more sustainable?
We had always been pretty conscious in our purchasing behavior, but we started to make some changes around the house to be better about wasting unneeded items, recycling, donations, etc.
Do you feel there is a stigma or lack of understanding of the climate crisis amongst South Asian communities? What do you believe the blockers to be and how would you go about solving the issues?
I feel there is a stigma and lack of understanding in all communities around the climate crisis. We think the issue is two-fold: 1. it is not an immediate impact you see within minutes or hours so it’s much harder to believe through experience vs education; 2. The climate crisis is a byproduct of many other crises such as textile waste, air pollution, water pollution, light pollution, and others; because there is so much that feeds into it, it’s hard for the average consumer to connect all of those dots instantly to make an informed decision.
We try to educate our consumers in the more micro sense; for example, close to 80 billion cubic meters of water was used by the textile industry in 2015 vs one of your t-shirts used enough drinking water for 1 person to drink for 2.5 years: the second fact is much more real, more micro, and more actionable and connects back to the same root.
Do you find such a lack of understanding makes having a sustainability-led business like yours more challenging?
Yes, but the good thing about consumer behavior in 2021 is that people are willing to learn and make smart choices and not get tricked by sales lingo.
In your opinion, what’s the future of South Asian fashion?
One of our brand partners said it best, “we come from a place that values its craftsmen and artisanship to the point where items are carefully produced over an extended period of time, then saved and shared for generations.” Fast fashion and this idea of “can’t wear the same thing twice” has completely thrown that value to the side.
South Asian fashion may never become majority secondhand, but what we hope to see is a larger emphasis on sustainable materials and more conscious production practices.
What advice would you give to younger generations in relation to sustainability and the environment?
They are giving US the advice! This younger generation is so smart in their purchasing decisions. They don’t only look for a cheap price tag and a familiar “swoosh” but dig deeper to learn about the company, the founders, the mission, and the impact. They are doing it in numbers and in every corner of their life – we all need to learn from them.
What have been your greatest successes and learnings?
Greatest learnings are definitely centered around how much we didn’t know about textile waste and what goes into production of garments.
Can you share one life story which has deeply impacted you?
Stories are difficult since some of the most impactful ones are very personal, but just as a general rule of thumb, we like to live our lives in the pursuit of doing good for others. It makes others feel good, and it makes us feel good – what more can you ask for!?
What is your ethnic, academic and professional background?
My family ethnicity is Gujarati Indian. My mum and her family were born and lived in Uganda until the early 1970’s when they were forced to flee to the UK under dictatorship. My dad and his family moved to the UK from Uganda shortly before. I graduated with a degree in Silversmithing, Jewellery and related objects and have been working as a Jewellery designer, maker and goldsmith for the last 13 years.
Can you tell me a bit about your jewellery business? How did it all start?
It started with my tutor during my year completing my Art foundation. I had always wanted to work within the fashion and textiles industry but my tutor could see where my skills lay and pointed me towards exploring jewellery. I immediately fell in love with working on and experimenting with small scale sculptural pieces.
I continued on to do a BA in Jewellery and Silversmithing, this is where I focussed on pushing myself creatively both in terms of design and making 3 dimensional forms in metal. I embraced the fact that as a student, there are no limitations on making pieces a certain way or a particular style – we were free to be as wildly creative as we wanted to be. The work I produced for my final show were more object than wearable jewellery; they were beautiful sculptural pieces in their own right and that idea has continued through the evolution of my work.
I started out working in silver, progressing into working exclusively in gold when I became a mother. My time to work was limited and making less but more involved pieces worked better, it also meant keeping a lean collection of one of a kind pieces and sourcing the best quality materials.
Seven years on and my business is opening into its next stage. With time, allowing myself the breathing space I have questioned and delved deep into aspects of heritage, culture (work, consumption, productivity), personal values, accessibility and identity. The results are in the work I am starting to build now after a recent relaunch.
What inspired you to become more sustainable and accessible? Is there a particular story you can share?
I think it started from a young age, seeing family, particularly the older generation share clothes, use and reuse everything, never being wasteful. The idea of excess, accumulated materials doesn’t sit well with me and never has. I remember even at the age of 10 or 11 having huge purges of ‘stuff’ in my bedroom and the sense of calm at seeing a clear space.
Over the last 20 years we (as a global society) have seen the devastation to the environment and the human cost of excessive production and consumption – I continue to educate myself about the harm being caused and try to find solutions by actively pushing against these standards. I think we have to build new models from the ground up rather than amend existing ones, show that there is another way and that it can work with a shift in mindset and active resistance to the status quo.
What have been your biggest successes and learnings to date?
One of my biggest successes has been to follow my own path and intuition, coming from a South Asian immigrant background and choosing to work as a creative has not been easy.
We’re strongly encouraged from a young age, like most immigrant communities, to find work in a stable career that will provide a good income and command ‘respect’ from the wider family. Actively going against this has been both liberating and tough.
Unlike many of my peers at university or those I have met through work, I didn’t grow up in a family that worked in the arts or had much interest in it outside of music. That privileged background just wasn’t there, on the flipside it meant that I had the freedom to make my own way. The striking learnings have been to avoid trying to fit into a box or anyone else’s expectation of what my work or I should be. Assimilating in this way can be more harmful than we realise, especially at a young age when we start our careers.
How have you actively changed your daily practice to be more sustainable?
At home we have gradually switched to buying natural products for our bodies and cleaning, soapnuts for all our laundry. We have consciously made decisions to support smaller local and more ethical companies whenever we can. One of the biggest changes for me has been learning how to make my own clothes. I understand now how much work goes into making our clothes, how materials and fabric production affect farmers and land on which they’re grown.
90% of my wardrobe is now made up of clothes that I have created myself.
My aim is for pieces to be loved and worn, mended, handed down, remade/upcycled if possible. We still have a way to go as a family but we’re mindful and making small changes as we move forward.
Do you feel there is a stigma or lack of understanding of the climate crisis amongst South Asian communities? What do you believe the blockers to be and how would you go about solving the issues?
I wouldn’t call it a stigma, more of a resistance to change/inconvenience. The lack of understanding I can see in older generations who may not engage with information about the environment in the same way that we or our parents might. I have noticed a shift as global awareness is raised, it’s impossible to ignore.
An area that I think is a blocker and difficult to overcome within South Asian communities is a cultural one, that lies in proving your status through material wealth. This has increased rapidly with each new generation due to the influence of western capitalism and the growth of economic wealth amongst the ‘upper class’ both in South Asia and the diaspora.
As always the best way to move past these blockers particularly with our elders is to talk to them. They tend to be open and respect the knowledge that younger generations bring.
You mentioned accessibility being a large factor to open up your market to other buyers, can you tell us more about that?
It boils down to the fact that I want my work to be available to anyone that would like to own a piece. I have spent time over the last year looking at who I am making the work for and why. My current collection of one of a kind pieces made in gold are true luxury items, I am well aware that they are for a small and niche market.
I am slowly building a collection of limited edition pieces that can be made to order. These pieces will be made in recycled gold to last a lifetime, they are designed to be repeatable and the price point will therefore be much more accessible.
Accessibility will also come through how I show and talk about the work.
It’s important for me to represent our South Asian heritage and style within the images and words, something I never had growing up.
To be open about the experiences that we as a community live through while also holding space for and supporting other minorities.
What processes are involved in being a more sustainable goldsmith? How do you cut down waste and reuse gold/silver?
I have slowly changed the way I run my business to be consciously sustainable both in the products I offer and how the studio is run. Every piece is now made using recycled silver/gold or Fairmined gold. Fairmined supports miners and their communities through providing safe working conditions, responsible use of chemicals, fair pay and social and educational development.
I produce small amounts of stock as currently the majority of my work is made to commission. As I start to move towards limited edition lines, I will continue to make pieces to order so that I can avoid overproduction of stock and waste. All metal offcuts and dust from the workshop are collected and remelted. I offer a bespoke recycling service, clients may have pieces that they have at home and no longer wear. I extract the stones and rework the gold to create a new custom-made piece with their materials.
In the workshop I minimise the use of harmful chemicals and water, I am making the transition to plastic free packaging and storage where possible.
Buying materials from small businesses is a way to be more sustainable. I work with suppliers and manufacturers that I have known and built relationships with. Suppliers of specialist cut stones work directly with mines where they can be sure that they are avoiding harmful practices to extract raw materials.
Can mining precious stones ever really be truly sustainable? Any thoughts on lab-grown stones?
The short answer is no. There is a finite amount of natural raw material on the planet and extracting these materials whether stones/mineral or metal has a human and environmental cost. I have done and continue to research the positives and negatives of natural vs. lab grown stones and it comes down to personal choice and the individual’s values.
Natural stones can be mined in ways that minimise damage to the environment; though human exploitation and working conditions are of more concern to me. There are over 40 million small-scale artisanal miners around the world extracting stones and gold and the majority of them face extreme working conditions and lack of safety. If we moved to producing all of our gems in labs these communities face more instability and often fall into greater poverty. There are many reasons that this continues to happen but really, when it comes to stones, particularly diamonds companies stand to make huge profits with miners receiving little monetary gain.
Lab-grown diamonds eliminate damage to the environment and human cost, so consumers can feel assured on this front. I looked into buying lab grown for my business, the more I researched I found that there is a huge amount of misleading information targeted towards the ‘ethical’ market. Lab grown diamonds use large amounts of energy to produce and where that energy is sourced is another factor to consider. You can read more here.
For now I choose to work with small suppliers that I trust who source directly from mines and know first-hand the conditions of extraction.
What advice would you give in relation to sustainability and the environment?
I would say get curious. Ask questions about where your products come from, how they are made, who is growing or making them. Hold companies accountable for their actions, write to your MP if you can. The best thing to do is choose one thing that matters to you and take action. It doesn’t matter how small the actions are, so many people feel overwhelmed, leading to inaction, but the small things do add up. Keep learning, keep challenging, and take care of yourself. Change starts with us!
Can you share one life story which has deeply impacted you?
I think that being so connected to a history of being uprooted, having grandparents and parents that moved to the UK with little in the way of possessions has subconsciously informed the way that I see materialism and excess. I try to be mindful about accumulating items by considering the intrinsic cost and value before I buy. This approach is crystallised in the way I think about production, it’s inevitably reflected within my work.
Is there anything else you’d like to share?
A few brilliant disruptors in the sustainability space and outside that I’m loving:
South Asians for Sustainability 