After more than a decade as a fashion designer, Dana Cohen was disillusioned. Excessive waste was rampant in every part of the industry – from surplus samples, to manufacturing scraps, to retail stores with “a disheveled mountain of garments that nobody wanted”, she said. “I was like, ‘I just don’t want to be a part of it any more.’”
Then Cohen, who had designed for brands including Banana Republic, Club Monaco and J Crew, had a chance encounter with a manufacturer that changed her course. Drishti Lifestyle, based in India, had a container full of leather scraps it didn’t want to discard. Together they experimented, and made some wallets and a handbag, all of which sold out. That was the very start of Cohen’s sustainable leather accessories company – and her mission to make a dent in the industry’s immense waste problem.
