What does luxury mean today?

To make the change, we must be the change.

Our planet is facing unprecedented environmental changes. Never has there been a more urgent time to look at ourselves, at our business practices, and at our ethics to make sure that we are part of the difference rather than part of the problem. Whatever the cause of the pressures which are changing our weather patterns and the availability of resources, we can and must be part of what turns things around and enables our planet to remain a beautiful and vibrant home to all living beings.

At LyZadie Design Studio We Are Committed To Operating A Forward-Thinking Practice Which Puts Sustainability, Quality, Social And Personal Responsibility At The Centre Of Everything We Do.

It’s daunting as well as exciting to be working in the sustainability design space. We look to international brands like Stella MacCartney and at home, KowTow, Allbirds and MaggieMarilyn who have made sustainability practices the starting point for their design ethos. Like them, we are concerned that our designs and products do not add to the growing issue of waste in our environment. We look for new materials that can operate in a circular economy – ensuring that the finite resources available aren’t exhausted by our manufacturing processes. Where possible, we use resources that have already seen a life, and bring them out of the line-up for landfill into new, lasting designs. Indeed, this was how our Re-Leathered Collection was born.  Sustainable products share the same essential qualities of luxury goods – they call for extraordinary creativity and design, they need to be high quality and they need to be made from exceptional materials. (1)

We Believe Strongly That Luxury Must Not Cost Us The Earth And That It Is About Creating An Emotional Response.

Our designs have always focused on making a minimal environmental impact. We use raw and rescued materials, and ensure that each piece is handcrafted in New Zealand, allowing us to control the environmental impact of our process from start to finish. What’s more we pride ourselves in providing transparency in that manufacture process because we want to connect our consumers and our makers, we feel it empowers the consumer. In our Flow collection for example, there is a location marker underneath each piece providing the exact coordinates of where the timber was rescued from. Having or owning a product that means something is something we feel passionate about.

Yet as we move into future planning, we are questioning whether this is enough. While the core components of our manufacturing processes are sustainability focused, we still strive to be a bigger part of the sustainability solution. We want to ensure every part of our business is ethically and sustainability focused. We want to move from reducing our impact to making a positive impact.

“Luxury: its feeling in harmony when you are surrounded by people you love, a natural landscape and living an authentic experience, this is, less is more. Beauty lies in the very small thing. And always with a high respect for the community you are in and the environment.”

Isabel Llorens, CEO & Founder, Rusticae.*

Your Future Is Our Future.

We want our customers and clients to ask more questions. We want them to push us to check if there is a better way, a new way that no one has investigated yet. We want to be the part of the solution that is practical and always striving to check international best practice. We want to be true to ourselves and to you.

We have therefore committed to enact a sustainability pledge for our company.

We will:

·      Always promote environmental responsibility and encourage innovation and use of environmentally friendly technologies.

·      Always choose suppliers and makers whose focus on sustainability practices matches our own.

·      Recognise our part in ensuring that our suppliers, partners and distributors implement their own sustainability practices and therefore commit to addressing any changes within in our company to ensure we can work together to create a process that holds sustainability at its core.

·      Never be complicit in human rights abuses.

·      Require all our suppliers and distributors to similarly respect and support their workers with a fair wage and freedom to express themselves within the letter and spirit of local laws.

This is our commitment to sustainability: being conscious of every aspect of the course of our design, manufacture and distribution of our products. Here at LyZadie Design Studio we are serious about our future. And we hope this gives you the peace of mind that you too, are letting the planet continue to sing.

“Luxury today is less about how shiny the material or expensive the price tag, but more about what values the products or services stand for. In fact, some of the very values people around the world are currently fighting for – whether sustainable living, fighting for equality or addressing climate change – is reflected in today’s luxury products.”

Tessa Gerlach, co-founder of Elephant Gin*

1.618 Sustainable Luxury

Earlier this year we were accepted into the 1.618 Sustainable Luxury community:

“We are so happy to welcome LyZadie Design Studio to the 1.618 community of creative sustainable brands! Coming from architecture and product design, the young New Zealand brand works only with local suppliers, local makers and sustainable sources. They are very concerned about the end of the life cycle of their products, everything they create can be recycled.

We are happy to introduce you this very pretty and luxury brand that has seduced us a lot! You will soon know more in our 1.618 Guide”.

The 1.618 Community members are native brands or transformative ones, committed in sustainability. We select them because they are first beautiful, creative, qualitative and desirable but also ethical and responsible as they create products or services with a positive impact! Words by 1.618 Sustainable Luxury.

Being part of a community that cares about what luxury means and its impact on the planet is incredible. It encourages us even more to keep creating luxury products which make a positive impact to this planet and turns the tide for the betterment of all of us and future generations. For us luxury means products that are designed from the outset to be better for the planet, handcrafted so they last and they are unique and they are passed down from generation to generations, using local makers to support our community and using incredible natural and raw materials. If our creations are not passed down then the materials can be recycled or are biodegradable.

As George Santayana said, “the Earth has music for those who listen.” We make it our business to listen, and trust you both see and hear the Earth sing through our designs.

Reference and more reading:

1- From the article LUXURY HAS ALWAYS BEEN SUSTAINABLE – AND HERE’S WHY by Stephen Armstrong.

* Quotes taken from the article AN EARTH-FRIENDLY FUTURE: 16 EXCLUSIVE QUOTES FROM OUR BRANDS ON WHAT LUXURY MEANS TODAY by Katie Stalker.