Since 2005, Elvis & Kresse has been rescuing raw materials, transforming them into chic lifestyle accessories and donating some of the profits to charity.
They collect decommissioned fire hoses, printing blankets, auction banners, tea sacks, and parachute silks. From the charming Elvis & Kresse workshop (housed in a mill in Kent), skilled craftspeople and their apprentices turn these materials into stunning bags, wallets, belts and even rugs. Elvis & Kresse wares are available through their website and on Modafirma, the thriving sustainable fashion platform.
Now the award-winning company has teamed up with the Burberry Foundation to continue their admirable crusade. Last October, they established a five-year partnership whose aim is to protect 120 tonnes of leather from ending up as landfill or being incinerated.
The off-cuts from Burberry’s production of leather goods will be incorporated into Elvis & Kresse’s accessories range. Fifty per cent of the profits from the newly created luxury goods will be donated to renewable energy projects.
Elvis & Kresse co-founder, Kresse Wesling MBE, explains: “Late last year, we launched an ambitious five-year partnership with the Burberry Foundation. The main aim of this is to scale our leather rescue project, starting with off-cuts from the production of Burberry leather goods.
“We are working tirelessly to expand our solutions and would love to welcome anyone to our workshop in Kent, to come and see what we are doing.”
On her passion for environmentalism, Wesling says: “My mum was fond of showing me a video on acid rain when I was young. Our parents fought to make a change in the 1960s – now we’re feeding on that. Bigger shifts need to come from millennials – hopefully they won’t be too late.”
Elvis & Kresse is cool, pioneering, innovative – and bound to make a difference. Their mantra says it all: “The future of luxury is sustainable, ethical, reclaimed, open, generous and kind.”
August 2018