"we want to be the brand that turned social responsibility sexy" March 25, 2006 2:12 pm >> Those are the words, Danish accented and all, that stuck in my mind as I got off the phone with Peter Ingwersen, CEO and founder of the high end luxury label Noir.
Noir first caught my attention with its beautiful clothes, but there was another layer of the label that really intrigued me. It was Illuminati II, the cotton fabric brand that Peter created to go hand-in-hand with Noir. The fabric Illuminati II produces isn't from any old cotton in Georgia. Rather, the brand takes raw Ugandan cotton and produces the finest sub-Saharan cotton fabric. Peter has set up the Noir Foundation to support this endeavor, giving percentages of the sales of cotton suits and fabrics back to the African cotton workers.
This is what really caught my attention -- this idea of fashion being socially conscious. So I asked Peter how he planned to convince the fashion crowd that they should support a cause like his -- because after all, the fashion world is not exactly known for its attention to social responsibility. It was obvious that Peter had spent a lot of time deliberating on this: "People buy clothes for different reasons," he told me. "Some want to send out a symbolic value, they want clothes that say, 'This is what I like, I'm into this.' They want to signal to the world that they can wear a certain brand. It's like their calling card to the world."
"This whole symbolic culture inspired me and my strategic thinking," Peter continued. "And I thought: 'Wouldn't it be fantastic if people could wear luxury clothing, showing that they can afford it and they're in the know, but also showing their point of view on a certain topic -- political, sexual, whatever it may be?'"
After these initial thoughts, Peter's whole strategy fell into place.
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