Anita Dongre shares her eco-friendly initiatives

By

Isabelle Crossley

Published
Jun 11, 2019

Designer Anita Dongre has transformed her various clothing brands into bastions of Indian sustainable fashion and shared the ways she is working to make the fashion industry more green.

On World Environment Day on June 5, Dongre took to social media to promote eco-friendly fashion. She shared steps that she has taken, both recently and over many years, to help the environment with her business. 

Dongre’s brands, which include Anita Dongre and Grassroot, use textiles that are biodegradable, renewable, and manufactured in an eco-friendly manner or recycled polyester fiber made from PET bottles. The designer shared that she not only uses sustainable textiles but also supports the craftspeople who make them. Dongre has created rural crafts training centres to teach women how to weave and offer them employment at her label. 

Dongre shared that 90 percent of her flagship stores have been fitted with LED lamps to save energy and the brand’s headquarters has reduced its energy consumption considerably. The headquarters, located in Mumbai, uses water faucets with water-saving aerator fixtures which save around 60 to 70 percent of water. Dongre’s headquarters also recycles dry waste, composts wet waste, and recycles 100 percent of its electronic waste.

The business also recently created an organic terrace garden at its headquarters to aid bio-diversity. As part of its green thumb initiative, the business also planted over 25,000 trees in Rajasthan’s Bassi Wildlife Sanctuary.

“With the growing threat of climate change, it’s important we make conscious efforts to live and work sustainably,” wrote Dongre on her social media. “We recognise that these are but baby steps on a long journey towards being mindful of our impact on the Earth. But we can in our own little ways strive today, to save tomorrow!”