For a project while still a student, Charmee Ambavat travelled to the North East and collaborated with local weavers and dyers. The collection they made was completely hand woven, naturally dyed and low waste, this deeply inspired her and she made the conscious decision to work and live in a more mindful way. In Charmee’s words, “The entire process made me delve deeper into my own life.”
This decision led her to create her brand Terra Tribe,the brand is a manifestation of living more sustainably. “Our vision as a brand is to build a community of earth conscious tribe and work towards building a carbon neutral future,” she says.
Terra Tribe designs contemporary clothing for people who are mindful of their impact on earth. The brand supports slow fashion at every turn and upholds its core values of transparency, favourable working conditions, low carbon footprint, unwavering quality, and circular ecology. The company is PETA-certified and entirely plant-based.
Terra is a latin word for earth, which also refers to being at one with nature. It represents a more sustainable way of life. Speaking on the name choice Charmee adds, “It is in line with our intention of building a planet conscious tribe.”
Making conscious clothing
“We make clothing using tencel which comes from the wood pulp of the eucalyptus tree and handwoven hemp which comes from the hemp plant,” Charmee says talking about the manufacturing process. She continues, “We then go on to natural dyes where the waste generated from the process is dealt with responsibly by our dye partner.”
Additionally, the brand also utilises recycled metal as trims whenever possible to avoid using any new metal.
The fabric is hand-dyed using natural dyeing methods before being employed by the brand’s talented master and tailors to create the garment. Each item of apparel is manufactured with care by working with ethical factories that prioritise quality, fair pay, and resource conservation. Ten artisans work on the dyeing process, while two work on the stitching process. Compared to conventional cotton, this fabric has a 5% lower water footprint. The brand also takes pride in supporting innovation, since their unique vortex spinning technique results in a 30% reduction in carbon emissions compared to traditional spinning. Indian madder vines, natural indigo, iron vinegar, and leaves are utilised as plant-based colours.
Speaking on their sustainability progress, Charmee adds, “We keep researching on new material, non toxic dyes, ways to deal with waste fabric, after care that isn’t taking a toll on the environment and hence making sure that we harm the least possible. We are soon introducing a program to plant trees for each product sold by us.”
Dreams & difficulties
The brand was launched in 2019, and of course there were challenges throughout those initial years. “We aren’t exactly in the business of upcycling and recycling, but yes, it does overlap sometimes,” Charmee tells us when speaking about the difficulties they encountered. “And I would say working with natural dyes is the most challenging part and we work on it every single day to make it better by looking for new vendors, studying about pigments, and doing a lot of experiments before we actually narrow down on the colours.”
“We would love for the brand to become a carbon neutral organisation and not cause any harm to the beautiful planet we live in with our design abilities and sustainability measures,” Charmee concludes speaking on the brand’s future plans.
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