Posts Tagged ‘apparel’
Don’t Hate the Player, Love His Style
It’s the Diamonds against the Camos in an extreme (and extremely stylish) game of capture the flag, featuring the Men’s Fall / Winter 2012 collections for Opening Ceremony and OC & Timberland. If only all outdoor sports were this much fun to watch:
ON YR MRK from Opening Ceremony on Vimeo.
Thanks and congrats to our friends at Opening Ceremony for producing this fine short film. To find your own game-day uniform, check out Opening Ceremony’s website and the OC & Timberland collection.
Fashion Fresh From the Sea
Maybe it’s a symptom of our Yankee frugality, but at Timberland we LOVE to recycle. There’s something oddly thrilling about giving old stuff like plastic bottles and discarded tires a second life as recycled materials in our products.
And as we get more excited about recycling, we get a little crazy. For example: Recycled coffee grounds in our S.Café® yarn (the grounds trap odors and absorb sweat — who knew?). And when you’re designing a jacket and you need it to be waterproof and durable, why not start by thinking about other materials that are waterproof and durable? Like, I dunno … fishing nets and ropes, salvaged from the ocean?
Introducing ReNet™ recycled nylon fabric:
Using ReNet™ in our products means less waste in the landfill (or worse – floating around in the ocean) — and wearing a jacket with ReNet™ in it gives YOU a whopper of a good story to tell on your next fishing trip.
Learn more about ReNet™ and the other recycled and renewable materials we use in our products in the Timberland Technology Guide.
Rock & Recycle: Expert Advice from Zero Hero
“Zero Hero” might sound like an oxymoron, but bear with me: this organization helps to make music and lifestyle festivals more eco-conscious and sustainable. We caught up with Zero Hero founder Bryan Birch at the 2012 Wanderlust Festival in Vermont earlier this summer and he gave us some tips on how to enjoy summer’s best events without leaving a huge environmental impact:
Buddy Up. Carpooling is way more fun than going solo anyway. Another responsible alternative? Using event-provided transportation, like the bio-diesel powered Wanderlust bus, to save gas money and CO2 emissions.
Wanderbus Roadtrip!
BYOBottle. Buying bottled water is so 2006. Bring your own reusable bottle to fill on site to save a few bucks and spare the environment your plastic waste.
Dress for success. Mom always said wear clean underwear and that’s a good start – even better is topping it with clothing and footwear made with recycled and renewable materials. Like these:
Earthkeepers Wharf Bomber Jacket, made with recycled nylon
Earthkeepers Radler Trail Low Approach, featuring recycled PET linings and recycled rubber in the outsoles
To see what other eco-tips Bryan has for staying green while you’re festival-ing this summer, visit the Expert Advice section of our men’s website.
Measuring What Matters and the Higg Index
Last week, the Wall Street Journal published an article about the newly-launched Higg Index, which will allow brands, factories and chemical manufacturers to score the relative sustainability of their products. Eventually, the intent is to also make that information available to consumers to better inform their purchasing decisions — much in the same way you can compare nutrition labels to make smart choices at the grocery store.
The Higg Index was developed by the Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC) in partnership with the Outdoor Industry Association Sustainability Working Group (OIA SWG). Timberland is proud to have been a founder, and to continue to play a leadership role, in both of these groups. In fact, the Higg Index was inspired in part by our Green Index® rating system, which “scores” Timberland products based on their environmental impacts.
The launch of the Higg Index is important news, and a sign that we’re moving in the right direction of increased transparency and sustainability in the footwear and apparel industry. We look forward to working with the other members of the SAC and OIA SWG as the tool develops.
Progress marches on!
What Happens When 400 lbs of Steel Meet PRO Boots?
The short answer is nothing good … the longer answer (complete with visual) you’ll find below in an email we received from Michael, a Timberland customer who most definitely does NOT have a desk job.
Hearing from Michael made our day – and do you know why? Because there’s nothing better than hearing from people who have nice things to say about their Timberland products. Check out the Timberlove:
A few weeks ago while working, a large 400 lb block of steel fell on my foot from about waist level. The way it landed, the tip of the steel toe took most the weight but part of the “foot print” of the landing caused it to hit above where the steel toe ended, resulting in a broken big toe. The boot held up, other than a gash in the leather. That aside, I know for sure if I was wearing any of my other brand boots … it could have been worse. I just have to say, as I walk on my foot that I still have, I’m definitely a lifetime Timberland customer.
Michael's Timberland PRO boot. Does anyone else's toe hurt just looking at this?
We also received the following from Hall — longtime Timberlover, first time commenter:
Over the past 15+ years I have purchased numerous Timberland garment items (jackets, shirts, shorts, socks, shoes, etc.), and I don’t recall that I have ever worn out any of these items to the extent that they are not still suitable for wear. This is an unsolicited compliment concerning the uncommon quality of all your products and, therefore, I am never reluctant to buy any garment that bears the name of your company.
I felt compelled to stop what I was doing and give you encouragement to continue providing the inimitable quality of products that I have experienced during the last 15 years and I thank you so much!!!
Believe it or not, we also like to hear it when our products don’t work the way they’re supposed to – knowing when there’s a problem helps us to create a solution. Got kisses or disses for us? Fire away.
Apparel Competitors Unite
These days, there are countless apparel manufacturers and labels out there that make their own unique eco-conscious claims. Problem is, nobody’s really on the same page on what truly constitutes an environmentally-friendly product. So what’s a consumer to believe? How can they make informed purchasing decisions when every company uses a different scorecard?
The answer is collaboration. Toward this end, an industry-wide group of leading brands, retailers, manufacturers, non-profits, academic experts and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency came together to create the Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC) . The SAC is working to reduce the environmental and social impacts of apparel and footwear products around the world by developing common measurements and a common environmental understanding of products’ impacts across our industry.
To accomplish this, the SAC built on the Outdoor Industry Association (OIA) ’s Eco Index™, a standardized tool for measuring the environmental impacts of outdoor products (things like boots, clothing, tents, and more). The Eco Index™ evaluates impacts in six key areas of a product’s lifecycle: Materials, Packaging, Product Manufacturing and Assembly, Transport and Distribution, Use of Service and End of Life.
The SAC adapted the Eco Index™ for apparel in an effort to give brands like Timberland more control over reducing environmental impacts right from the outset, rather than relying on factories. Factories, too, will benefit from the Index, by having only one standard of measurement to respond to, rather than a different set of standards for each and every brand. In this way, suppliers will be able to focus more on solutions, rather than audits and testing.
The SAC’s adapted Eco Index™ is now being pilot tested in factories. The ultimate goal is to develop a tool that can be used by brands and factories to improve the environmental sustainability of their industry, and by consumers to make more informed decisions about the products they buy.
To learn more about the ways in which Timberland is working to create its products with processes and materials that cause less harm to the environment, please visit the Responsibility section of our website.
Stay Comfortable
No one wants to get rubbed the wrong way – especially by an errant seam or zipper or poorly-placed button. Here’s Dean, our senior director of apparel, talking about how we design our gear not just for performance, but for comfort as well:
You can learn more about the innovative technologies and materials we use to make our products comfortable (and warm, and dry, and eco-conscious) by checking out the Timberland Technology Guide.
And speaking of comfort, have you put your feet in a pair of SmartWool socks lately? Click here to shop our entire SmartWool collection.
Stay Warm
Here in New Hampshire, it’s so cold that the forecast calls for SNOW … which makes the idea of staying warm more important than ever. Here’s our senior director of apparel, Dean, back again to explain the natural inspiration (two words: polar bears) for the technology we use to make our gear thinner, lighter and warmer:
If you think that’s cool, check out the Timberland Technology Guide, where you’ll find a boatload of other videos and information about the innovative technologies and eco-conscious materials we use to create durable products that keep you comfortable, dry and warm.
And if flurries are in your local forecast, you’ll want to dress accordingly … shop our winter collections for men and women now.
Stay Dry
As a brand built on the very idea of “waterproof,” we spend a lot of time thinking about the best way to keep you dry – both from the outside and the inside. Here’s Dean, our senior director of apparel, on why breathability is so important in designing waterproof gear:
Dry = happy is a pretty simple equation, but there’s a lot of innovative technology behind it. To learn more about the ways we’re working waterproof into our products (and your closet), check out the new Timberland Tech Guide.
