You are most welcome to visit us at www.facebook.com / Arkadia International Bookshop and “like” us if you wish!

Dear friend of Arkadia,

You are invited to the screening of “Take it Slow! Sustainable Fashion for the local community in Kallio, Helsinki” (2015) on Friday 5.2 at 6 pm at Arkadia (Nervanderinkatu 11)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhAw-Yjb-yw&feature=youtu.be

The film was produced by
Dr. Olga Gurova, Alisa Javitz, Daria Morozova and Kevin Drain.

The film lasts approximately 26 minutes.

All are heartily welcome to join the discussion after the screening!

Warm regards,

Ian
www.arkadiabookshop.fi

– A donation of €3 (or more!) to fund the bookshop is suggested and would be most welcome. Arkadia wouldn’t exist without this act of generosity. If you have no loose change or coins we gladly accept payment via Visa Electron or Mastercard etc. !

Take it Slow! Sustainable Fashion for the local community in Kallio, Helsinki” (2015).

This is a research-based film that tells about sustainable fashion in Kallio district of Helsinki. Sustainable fashion (along with synonymic eco-fashion and slow fashion) feels itself at home in Kallio:

second-hand and vintage stores, designers’ studios, seamstresses’
workshops, stores with organic products, little cafes and restaurants, festivals and other events such as “cleaning day” and “restaurant day”
greatly contribute to values of sustainability.

We have interviewed 9 clothing designers and seamstresses who have adopted sustainable approach to clothing production. The designers, whose collections range from women’s clothing to jewelry, explain why sustainable fashion is worth trying, and how they balance creativity against entrepreneurship, as well as reflect upon the future of their businesses in times of economic hardship. We tried to capture an ordinary working day of the designers, so that audience would get the gist of how they work, and how an idea of a sustainable product comes into being through work and creativity.

The research group that produced the film consists of four people:

Dr. Olga Gurova (PhD in Cultural Studies, Academy of Finland Research Fellow at the Department of Social Research, University of Helsinki) has long been studying consumption in the fashion field. During the past five years, she has been working on the project “Consumption inRussia: Institutions, Identities and Everyday Life”.

Olga has authored a book “Fashion and the Consumer Revolution in Contemporary Russia” (Routledge, 2014) as well as multiple articles based on this research.

Currently Olga is interested in slow-fashion and how it is practiced by Finnish designers.

Alisa Javitz is a visual artist and a PhD student at the Film Department of the Aalto University, Helsinki. Alisa was responsible for the camera and editing of the film. Alisa has previously created visual works about the collections of Finnish fashion designers (see, for example, Roots and Bonds; Shiosai – Sound of Eternity at http://alisajavits.fi/commissioned-work/). Alisa’s personal exhibition “Green Elephant” has been recently organized in Gallery Hippolyte in Helsinki.

Daria Morozova (MA in Social Policy and Urban Studies, Doctoral Student at the Central European University, Budapest), has worked with Gurova for Academy of Finland project “Consumption in Russia:
Institutions, Identities and Everyday Life” in 2012-2014. She has recently shifted her interests towards Politics.

Kevin Drain – a narrator in the film – holds degrees from the geography departments of both UCLA and the London School of Economics, and is currently working on PhD on urban geography at the University of Helsinki.