SAVAGE SENSES

We are very happy to be involved with Savage Senses. The water crisis is a huge problem, but with more organizations like Savage Senses stepping up to the plate and saying “No More” we can make a greater difference tomorrow than we did today. They have generously pledged 10% of their proceeds to Wine To Water and we can’t thank them enough for the support! So, we want to go ahead and highlight some of our favorite Savage Senses products.

A product that really caught my eye was the Recycled Glass Beach Charm Suede Necklace. I’ve walked on the beach countless times picking up random seashells and pieces of smoothed glass while thinking this would make a great necklace.  Well, the SS crew beat me too it! I love the connection back to water too. Each piece is strung on a natural colored string of suede, so you know it’s comfortable. Very cool piece!

~Josh Elliott and the WinetoWater.org Team

We are very happy to be involved with Savage Senses. The water crisis is a huge problem, but with more organizations like Savage Senses stepping up to the plate and saying “No More” we can make a greater difference tomorrow than we did today. They have generously pledged 10% of their proceeds to Wine To Water and we can’t thank them enough for the support! So, we want to go ahead and highlight some of our favorite Savage Senses products.

—Josh Elliott and winetowater.org

1. What is your favorite sector of the Savage Senses brand? 

 My favorite part of Savage Senses is our one of a kind ready to wear pieces and accessories. The Water Raw Materials collection features silk georgette tunics and hand dyed linen scarves perfect for any look, day or night. Savage Senses uses a unique dying process that gives each piece irregularities that are truly one of a kind.

2. How has Savage Senses made a difference in clean water initiatives? 

Savage Senses donates 10 % of sales to CNN Don Henley’s Wine to Water which is a  non-profit aid organization focused on providing clean water to needy people around the world.  Nearly one billion people in the world today lack access to adequate water and 2.5 billion people lack access to improved sanitation. At Savage Senses we work to raise awareness to these issues through remaining completely eco conscience.  

3. What sets SS apart from other brands?

What sets us apart from other brands is that each piece is designed, fabricated, and branded with care by its two owners Waldo Tejada and Gary Nelson. They both are world travelers and have been entrenched in the fashion industry for many years. They’re attention to detail and work ethic is flawless and it truly shows in each piece.

4. What types of events have you worked on for the brand?

For Savage Senses RT-PR helped launch the brand at The Jimmy during NYFW in February 2012. Right out of the gate, we were featured in Women’s Wear Daily…which for a new brand like Savage Senses is MAJOR!  Recently, we launched our latest collection Water Raw Materials, at Environment Furniture showroom. DJ Cory Kennedy spun great music as our guests explored the new looks and accessories. 

5. Describe the ideal Savage Senses customer.

Our ideal customer is of course casual and chic but also aware of the role each of us play in creating a more conscience world.

We’d love to hear your thoughts so check Savage Senses, DJ Cory Kennedy, Wine to Water and RTPR out online and via Twitter and Facebook!

Each week we’re unveiling items in our collection. Spread the word and stay tuned!

One of Savage Senses founders, Waldo Tejada, takes us behind the curtain to see exactly what it’s like to open a fashion showroom.

1. What is it like to be in a showroom?

To have the opportunity to be in a showroom in NYC is a great moment for a fashion line and a special milestone for any fashion start-up company. Our vision is to reach as many fashion directors, buyers and editors and have them interact with the collection first hand. 

2. When a buyer comes to the showroom—what will they find?

Our “Water -Raw Materials” SS 2013 collection consists of uniquely design 100% silk, 100% Cotton Fleece and 100% linen pieces which are hand-dipped and hand-printed in New York, in addition to  our hand-printed canvas bags (all shown in our website http://savagesenses.com/). We have extended the collection with other 100% silk pieces (not show in the website) and 100% certified farmed crocodile trimmed canvas bags for an additional element of luxury.

3. How is the Savage Senses showroom unique to others?

We have been given the opportunity to be part of a great space shared with very well known brands like Chloe, Missoni, Balmain Beach Wear and Just Cavalli Beach Wear. We feel honored and humbled to be next to such recognized brands right in the heart of New York City.

4. What’s been the biggest challenge to setting up the Savage Senses showroom?

Certainly the biggest challenge was editing down the collection; we have grown to loved all the pieces that we’ve worked so hard designing and it was kind of sad to not include some of them. At the end is all good as those pieces will make it to our website e-commerce later in the year, giving everybody a chance to fall in love with them as we did.

5.  Be honest—have you danced around the showroom yet? And if so—what music was on your iPod when you did it?

Well I did not jump up and down, but was kind of lip-synching while setting up the hangers and listening to BUIKA on my iPod.

Production method

The quality of the finished linen product is often dependent upon growing conditions and harvesting techniques. To generate the longest possible fibers, flax is either hand-harvested by pulling up the entire plant or stalks are cut very close to the root. After harvesting, the seeds are removed through a mechanized process called “rippling” or by winnowing.

The fibers must then be loosened from the stalk. This is achieved through retting. This is a process which uses bacteria to decompose the pectin that binds the fibers together. Natural retting methods take place in tanks and pools, or directly in the fields. There are also chemical retting methods; these are faster, but are typically more harmful to the environment and to the fibers themselves.

After retting, the stalks are ready for scutching, which takes place between August and December. Scutching removes the woody portion of the stalks by crushing them between two metal rollers, so that the parts of the stalk can be separated. The fibers are removed and the other parts such as linseed, shive, and tow are set aside for other uses. Next the fibers are heckled: the short fibers are separated with heckling combs by ‘combing’ them away, to leave behind only the long, soft flax fibers.

After the fibers have been separated and processed, they are typically spun into yarns and woven or knit into linen textiles. These textiles can then be bleached, dyed, printed on, or finished with a number of treatments or coatings.

An alternate production method is known as “cottonizing” which is quicker and requires less equipment. The flax stalks are processed using traditional cotton machinery; however, the finished fibers often lose the characteristic linen look.

Producers

Flax is grown in many parts of the world, but top quality flax is primarily grown in Western Europe. In very recent years bulk linen production has moved to Eastern Europe and China, but high quality fabrics are still confined to niche producers in Ireland, Italy and Belgium, and also in countries including Poland, Austria, France, Germany, Denmark, Lithuania, Latvia, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Britain and Kochi in India. High quality linen fabrics are now produced in the United States for the upholstery market.

—Learn more about this topic from Wikipedia

documentarychannel:

With the remarkable issue doc Last Call at the Oasis opening this Friday, I’m re-posting the first part of my interview with director Jessica Yu from the Toronto Film Festival last fall. It begins here and then continues over at its original home at Spout.

As I noted in my review of “Last Call at the Oasis,” I’m not always for the big issue docs that try to save the world. So I was pleasantly surprised to really enjoy and appreciate how Jessica Yu worked with a grand-scale cause such as water. As in water shortage, water contamination and really any every other water-related problem affecting some part of the world today. I just had to talk to the Oscar-winning filmmaker, known previously for nontraditional docs like “In the Realms of the Unreal” and “Protagonist” and the fictional sports comedy “Ping Pong Playa,” to find out her secret recipe for making a great issue doc that isn’t heavy on scare tactics or boring fact sheets. The first part of this conversation is below. You can find the second part, about documentary immediacy, at the Documentary Channel Blog.

You’re not really known for issue films. How did you get involved with this?

Jessica Yu: Water is one of the five urgent threats that Participant is targeting, and I knew Diane Weyermann from Sundance and at Participant and I really respect her. So when she came to me about it, I think my initial reaction was that it’s so awesome to make a film about water because it’s so visual. We think of beautiful water, when we think of it, like waterfalls and streams.

The second thing I knew is that I felt like I was fairly aware of water issues, but I thought if we’re making a film about water, whatever I find is going to be much, much worse than what I think I know. The problems that are out there are much more intense and immediate than I had anticipated. That was interesting to me, the way we have a mental image of water and we have the way we think about water and then we have what’s actually happening.


Your past nonfiction films show you have a great interest in arts and storytelling, so you bring something great to the issue doc genre, where others might be concerned only with facts, facts, facts.

All documentaries — all films — should be storytelling. But here there’s a challenge because there’s a certain amount of information people need to have to put the big picture together. I like the challenge of trying to figure out how you make all these things not abstractions. You have to tell people stories so it sticks, because they care about the situation.

The other thing we were looking for is stories that were not the most obvious. We started with Vegas because if you ask someone what city should be worried about water, everyone knows. And then from there it’s like, well it’s not just Vegas…

Continue reading at Spout.

Excellent interview with Last Call at the Oasis director Jessica Yu. If you missed our review of the documentary, you can find that here!

We’d like to share this inspirational story from the Wine to Water blog about a high school student getting involved with the organization to help provide clean water access to people in Cambodia:

Tiffany Song, a student from Northern Guilford High School, approached us last year about doing her senior project on WTW. Below is her story in her words. Tiffany, thank you for all your hard work! We have no doubt that you will succeed as you move into college and beyond. 

-WTW Team

As my senior year in high school draws to a close, I keep reminiscing about a few things. I often find myself thinking about the moments and milestones that have defined my four years in high school. There’s the typical stuff, like The First Day and Homecoming and my first AP exam and Prom. However, there’s also a not-so-typical milestone that especially stands out in my mind: The Senior Project.

Read More →

Water is the undeniable thread that runs through all living beings on this planet. It touches our lives in all its forms, expressing itself as vapor in the clouds, as liquid in the rain, oceans, rivers and as solid in ice and snow. It is the source of all life, and without it, life cannot sustain itself.

Water is the fundamental inspiration for the Savage Senses collection. We believe that everyone has the right to clean and accessible water. 10% percent of all retail sales are dedicated towards CLEAN WATER initiatives and in 2012 we’ve chosen to get involved with CNN Hero, Doc Hendley’s “Wine to Water” organization.