The gift of beauty

Internationally acclaimed Living Nature has launched its new Advanced Renewal Night Serum, part of its award-winning serum and oil range. Powered by 100 per cent natural and 78 per cent organic ingredients, it targets the signs of ageing and promotes healthy skin while you sleep. To make it even more indulgent, there’s a luscious vanilla pear fragrance.
   Living Nature has also announced its new lipstick gift set with a trio of sought-after shades. There’s a smart gift box with gold foil accents. The serum retails for NZ$49, and the lipstick set for NZ$66. Find out more at www.livingnature.com.

Smelling sweeter

Lancôme is known for its rose symbol, because of the love of the flower by its founder, Armand Petitjean. And now it’s in the business of growing and cultivating roses to ensure supply for its fragrances. At the Domaine de la Rose in Grasse, a region classified as a UNESCO cultural heritage site, Lancôme will be growing its own roses for the first time with a sustainable, zero-waste process. The company says it will cultivate the centifolia rose, along with olive, plum and fig trees, other plants native to the region, and ancient aromatic plants. There will also be beehives on the site. Next time you sample a Lancôme fragrance, it may well have been created with these eco-friendly roses.

Protect and hydrate

Sunny days always demand good sunscreen protection and Australia’s award-winning Bondi Sands knows a thing or two on the subject. Its new Hydra UV Protect range both protects and hydrates the skin, using plant-based hydration. The range is also infused with ethically sourced algæ, and is reef-friendly. The ingredients also help sooth and nourish after sun exposure. Pictured is the After Sun alœ vera cooling foam, complementing the sunscreen spray, sunscreen lotion, and SPF 50-plus face lotion. Head to www.bondisands.com for more information.

Wood notes

Young Living’s Shutran bar soap features a vegan-friendly essential oil blend, for those who like a clean, woody flavour. It’s been formulated not to dry skin, and gives a creamy lather. For more information on Young Living’s extensive range, visit www.youngliving.co.nz.

Lucire is the first fashion partner of UN Environment.

The New Zealand winner of the James Dyson Award is in the fashion sector: Rik Oithuis, a Massey University student, conceived his Voronui Runners, shoes that can be composted at the end of their life.
   Despite many labels trying to do the right thing by the environment—many of which have been profiled by this magazine, a UN Environment partner since 2003—92 million tonnes of textile waste is created each year. As detailed in Lucire, Abigail Beall at the BBC points out that this is ‘equivalent to a rubbish truck full of clothes’ arriving at a landfill every second. Only 12 per cent of the material for clothing is recycled, says Beall. Footwear is one of the culprits in the sector, with the James Dyson Foundation noting that since 1950, the amount of footwear globally has increased from 7,000 million to 23,000 million, with most shoes ending up in landfill. The average pair takes over 50 years to decompose, with footwear representing 1·4 per cent of global climate impacts. The footwear industry’s waste is increasing tenfold, note Theodoros Staikos and Shahin Rahimifard in their research.
   This makes Oithuis’s concept of a biodegradable shoe all the more important to our planet. He says, ‘Currently, footwear materials focus on performance, which is important, especially in runners. However, what isn’t being considered is what happens to the product once it’s no longer of use. The use of adhesives prevents the separation and treatment of materials at the end of the product’s life cycle. I was inspired to design a sneaker using only biodegradable materials with no adhesives—leading the future of sustainable footwear.’
   Oithuis developed a gelatine- and glycerine-based recipe for biodegradable foam, adding natural ingredients to strengthen the material, compress it, and make it more water-resistant. He then 3-D-printed a Voronoi structure using a biodegradable filament to form the skeleton of the sole and mid-sole. The upper was made from a merino wool fabric with 3-D-printed details. The heel and toe caps were inserted with a plant fibre reinforcement, then sewn shut and stitched.
   Runners-up included Massey University students Lisa Newman and Samantha Hughes, who created a hand tool to maintain clean cattle tails and a pædiatric urine sample collection device respectively.
   Rachel Brown, ONZM, founder and CEO of the Sustainable Business Network, Dr Michelle Dickinson, and engineer Sina Cotter Tait judged the national competition.
   Oithuis will receive a £2,000 award to develop his design. He, Newman and Hughes will go on to the international stage, where a top 20 will be selected by Dyson engineers. Sir James Dyson will select the international and sustainability winners from that group. The former will get a £30,000 prize and £5,000 going to their university, and the latter will receive £30,000. Winners will be announced on November 19.

Top and above: By Mishco’s limited-edition masks have proven to be strong sellers. Below left: Ketz-ke’s bold mask designs.

New Zealand label Ketz-ke, featured in Lucire KSA’s September 2020 issue, has, like numerous other fashion labels, created designer masks. Masks—as predicted in Victoria Whisker’s recent story—have become a fashion item, and Ketz-ke’s more than qualify, with their bold designs. They’re retailing at three for NZ$36·50.
   They’re not alone. A new label set up in August reached a milestone when it sold 50 limited-edition masks per hour. By Mishco, founded by Ayla Bligh, set up to provide work for six women made redundant or suffered reduced hours because of COVID-19, sold out of its limited-edition lines within a week.
   Bligh referred to recent statistics that revealed that over 90 per cent of the 11,000 redundancies in New Zealand during the second quarter of 2020 were faced by women. It was her aim to empower women and keeping production local.
   By Mishco has scaled up production of its cotton–linen blend masks to meet demand, and is launching a line of children’s masks. Locals can collect using contactless methods. The company sold through a Facebook group called Chooice and more information can be found at bymishco.co.nz.

The Simpsons might not be part of the cultural Zeitgeist in the same way it was in the early 1990s, but over the last 30 years it’s built up a immense following—enough for it to remain a tempting licensing target. Vans is the latest, and arguably one of the higher-profile, fashion brands to pay tribute to Springfield’s yellow-skinned family, with a collection of footwear, apparel and accessories.
   The Simpsons family appears on the Sk8-Hi shoes, both in their original form from The Tracey Ullman Show and in their definitive form once they were spun off into their own series; individual characters can be found on Old Skool and Sk8-Hi designs. There are Lisa Simpson items with ‘Lisa Simpson for president’ slogans; a Sk8-Lo shoe design features Bart Simpson’s ‘El Barto’ graffiti tag. Subsidiary characters get a look-in, too, with Krusty the Klown, the Bouvier sisters, Otto, Moe, Lenny, Carl and Barney, and even Itchy and Scratchy, and Blinky the three-eyed fish. Socks, caps, fleece hoodies, and T-shirts complete the collection.
   In New Zealand, the collection will be available from August 15. More information can be found at vans.co.nz/thesimpsons.

The Body Shop is teaming up with Wā Collective to provide free, medical-grade silicone period cups to people and schools in need in New Zealand.
   The New Zealand Government is already tackling period poverty by providing free menstrual products in select Waikato schools, but, as the Body Shop points out, this is only as starting-point and the only products available are tampons and pads.
   The Body Shop supports the use of period cups for environmental reasons, among others: each lasts 10 years, reducing waste going to landfill, and can save the individual a considerable amount of money.
   Currently one in three menstruating students have had to skip class because they do not have access to menstrual products.
   As Wā Collective founder Olie Body points out, ‘Nobody should miss out because of being born with a mighty pair of ovaries.’
   Wā Collective has established women’s health collectives and other contacts to help with distribution.
   It estimates that through its work, it has prevented 2·4 million disposable products going to landfill over the past year, saving people NZ$800,000.
   The campaign will go live in 25 Body Shop stores around New Zealand from August 4.
   Customers can support the initiative by purchasing items from Wā Collective (www.wacollective.org.nz), using the code BODYSHOP for free shipping, or simply donating at any of the Body Shop’s stores nationwide or online at www.thebodyshop.co.nz. Each Wā cup sold subsidizes another for someone in Aotearoa.

Shine on

Living Nature has released a new natural lipstick, Glamorous. As with all Living Nature products, it is natural, using natural waxes, butters and oils, including shea butter and jojoba oil. Not only do your lips shine with Glamorous’s intense colour, they are nourished. There is a single shade, created to suit all complexions. It is available in New Zealand through selected pharmacies and health stores, and online at www.livingnature.com.

For summer skin

001 Skincare London is the luxury brand founded by facialist and acupuncturist for many famous names, Ada Ooi. Her new Pure Lavender Hydrolat Toner, made with 99 per cent first-grade lavender, is the perfect summer accessory, a multi­tasking product that acts as a cleanser, toner, make-up-setting spray and even as a mask. The hydrolat toner instantly lifts dried and tired skin, working to soothe, tone and tighten the skin, effortlessly hydrating and balancing its pH levels. This product is also a complexion booster that can be sprayed directly onto the skin or applied using a cotton pad. Looking to give that extra care to your skin during the summer? This is the perfect product for you. Find out more at www.001skincare.com.—Meg Hamilton

Back to the ’70s

The eyeshadows and highlighters in the new collection by Nomad are the life of the party, taking us back to the glitz and glamour of the 1970s in style. Inspired by the rich scene of Studio 54, a place where many creative minds gathered to create great art and music in the ’70s, the Multi-Chrome Discoshadow collection infuses this energy with the disco era to create a eyeshadow palette and two highlighters that are truly ethereal and out of this world. Packed with glitter, the Multi-Chrome Discoshadow Palette contains four unique shifting shades. Le Freak is a static and striking yellow-gold, I’m Coming out is a party-all-night hot pink and lavender, Got to be Real is a cool silver with subtle hints of green, and Last Dance is the perfect classic ’70s blue with a silver shift. Combine these with the two highlighters, Hot Shot in a shimmering pink inspired by the queens of disco, and Disco Nights, in pure dazzling gold, this collection is certain to keep you dancing all night long.—Meg Hamilton