Project Runway‘s seventh-season winner, Seth Aaron Henderson, plans to debut his first post-PR collection at Portland Fashion Week this fall. And the word on the street is that he’s planning to center the show on a theme of solar energy.

Ecorazzi reports:

Striking while the iron is hot, the 38 year old has wisely melded his passion for solar technology with his obvious love for fashion-forward duds by creating a new collection – soon to be unveiled on October 9th at the turbo-sustainable, carbon neutral Portland Fashion Week — that tips its hat off to the event’s Oregon-based renewable energy sponsor, SolarWorld.

Against a catwalk backdrop of slick black photovoltaic panels, Henderson’s designs, which embrace this year’s theme “Solar Is The New Black”, will be laden with sun-lovin’ detailing although he’s mum on exactly how he’s going to make it all come together.

We’re excited to see how this fresh face on the fashion scene will make it work!

The Los Angeles Times this week reviewed some of the newcomers to the eco-beauty bandwagon, and they all have one unique trait in common: a food-based ingredient list.

“It’s happening like crazy,” Karen Young, chief executive of the Young Group, a consulting company that works with beauty brands, said of the increased prevalence of food in skin care. “We’re learning more and more about skin and nature, and about the interaction between the two.” Young said segments of the U.S. beauty industry are increasingly leaning toward natural, organic and homegrown products as customers veer away from chemicals and synthetics.

“In other parts of the world, it is normal to use food and elements of nature for medicinal or beauty purposes,” she said. “In America we are just waking up to that now.”

The article cites brands like the Body Deli out of Palm Desert, Calif., and Farmhouse Fresh from Frisco, Tex. One maker we can vouch for is Elique Organic Skin Food, which sources its foodie-quality ingredients from Los Angeles’s famed farmers markets. And coming this summer, Elique’s founder Elisha Reverby will be offering classes out of her salon in Venice, Calif., to teach students how to make their own eco-beauty products at home (details TBA here). Sign us up!

London Jewellery Week just wrapped up on Sunday, and to commemorate the fabulous flash of this glittering event, the Guardian published its guide to buying feel-good baubles.

Among the newspaper’s picks for the event’s best designers, many of whom were new to us:

First up, April Doubleday. She gets her inspiration from the coastline of Devon, where she is based, and FS particularly likes her glass collection(pendants from £75). Avasarah, a rather fabulous online ethical jewellery shop, has its own range too, with some excellent prices. This sweet hummingbird disc is made from 100% recycled silver, and is manually produced (no heat or chemicals involved). You can add on charms, but we think it’s nice just as it is, and for a bargain £29 too. More natural inspiration – but with a rather fabulous twist – can be found at Leblas, where this recycled silver and spearmint enamel pendant (£160) is a great combination of wearable yet distinctive. Note: the spearmint is not edible. Alas.

Over at CRED (the host for the ethical section of the show, no less), we’re in love with this gorgeous pendant by Annabel Panes. Inspired by Nepali designs, it’s handmade from 100% recycled silver by the Harigni Cooperative in Nepal (£85 for silver, also comes in gold).

Call us squirrels, but we’re suckers for pretty, shiny things — especially when they come with an ethical stamp of approval.

URTH Ethical Spearmint & Silver Pendant, £175 at Leblas.com.

Last night, Michael Kors received the Geoffrey Beene Lifetime Achievement Award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) — and we can’t think of a more deserving honoree.

We at EthicalStyle.com admire his commitment to personal style and reducing wardrobe waste. We strive to live by his words:

“70 percent of the clothes you own should be meat and potatoes. 30 percent should be icing and fluff — that’s colour, pattern, shine, accessories. Too many women get the proportions the other way round, then can’t figure out why they can’t get dressed.”

Bravo to Mr. Kors!

Pictured here: Gwyneth Paltrow makes her entrance last night in a stunning Michael Kors gown, with the designer looking dapper in the background.

Tomorrow morning, the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York will open its doors to the “Eco-Fashion: Going Green” exhibit, on display through November 13.

The exhibition features innovations in eco-design over the past 250 years, from a hand-loomed silk brocade dress circa 1760 to modern-day names like Bodkin, Edun, and FIN.

According to the curators, everything on display represents one of the following broadly defined themes:

• the repurposing and recycling of materials
• material origins
• textile dyeing and production
• quality of craftsmanship
• labor practices
• the treatment of animals

Admission is free, so if you’ll be in the city over the next six months, stop in and kill an afternoon admiring these works of eco-art.

The Museum at FIT, Seventh Avenue at 27th Street, New York, N.Y., 10001. (212) 217-4700.

Attendees of the International Wool Textile Organisation (IWTO) conference last week were told to expect a large PETA presence opposed to the use of wool in fashion, but only one protestor showed up in Paris.

The protestor held up a sign that read “Australia Stop Mulesing Now,” gave a two-minute speech, and left peaceably.

The response to the one-woman protest was mixed, according to the Rural Press. Conference-goers felt the small showing meant anti-mulesing efforts are losing traction, but PETA insists that is not the case.

[W]hen Rural Press contacted PETA and asked if they felt they were losing support for their campaign against surgical mulesing, Ashley Fruno, Senior Campaigner PETA Asia-Pacific, denied it was.

Instead, Mr Fruno insisted that its protest in Paris was “very successful.”

“The activists didn’t expect to get in, but we were thrilled that they were able to and give such a long speech, as well as speak to many people afterwards,” Mr Fruno said.

Catch up on the mulesing debate here.

For the past few years, Gen Art has done a fabulous job of showcasing up-and-coming green designers (and attracting big names like Maggie Gyllenhaal to its runway events). Sadly, last week, GenArt announced that it would be shuttering for good.

But not before cashing the checks of several young designers looking for their big break, according to WWD.

Chicago jewelry designer Veronica Martens is particularly miffed that Gen Art organizers accepting a $550 payment from her for booth space on April 28, then announced a week later that the event would not be happening as planned:

“They obviously knew when they cashed my check that they were closing the doors on the business, and it makes me sick to think that they stole money from me and my fellow indie designers who are already struggling to make ends meet,” said Martens.

Gen Art has done a lot of good in the past, so we hope the organizers make it up to these designers — and fast.

Fashion blogger Garance Doré is finding herself at the center of a controversy regarding her opinions in U.K. Vogue on the advent of plus-size models:

“It should not be such a big deal to show women with different bodies, but sometimes it’s treated like a bit of joke, or for shock, like the plus-size models on the runway in the UK Fashion Week,” said Doré, who attended the Mark Fast show – amongst others – during [London Fashion Week] with her Sartorialist boyfriend Scott Schuman. “It’s not such a good thing to show plus-size because it’s not really physically healthy and not always flattering to fashion.”

Oof. The “health argument” doesn’t hold a lot of water when the models in question — Crystal Renn and Hayley Morley both walked during the Mark Fast show — wear a U.K. size 16 dress, equivalent to a U.S. size 12. That’s hardly The Biggest Loser territory. (And we’ll refrain from commenting on Doré’s own smoking addiction.)

Finally, for the record, we’re of the belief that well-designed clothing is supposed to be flattering to the body, not the other way around. Since when does the dress wear the woman?

(via MyFashionLife.com)

Women of the Green Generation is presenting its first annual eco-expo on June 12 in downtown Los Angeles.

The all-day event will feature 50 green businesses and experts to help you make long-lasting changes to your carbon footprint — not just in the fashion and beauty arenas, but in your home and lifestyle as well.

Speakers include Rebecca Harrell Tickell, author of the book Hot, Rich and Green; Rachel Avalon, the 2009 winner of the Project Green Search modeling competition; Sophie Uliano, the woman behind Gorgeously Green: 8 Simple Steps to an Earth-Friendly Life; and dozens more.

And here’s a great little extra: The event sponsors will be offering rides to attendees on an algae-fueled bus that picks up in Santa Monica.

Too cool!

Tickets to the expo are $50 and can be purchased here.

Canada is not about maple leaves and Mounties, folks. It’s also the home of some of the best and the brightest in the eco-design community.

A romantic spring/summer 2010 look for Canadian label Thieves, designed by Sonja den Elzen. (Courtesy of Thieves.ca)

And with all those pristine mountains and rivers, it makes perfect sense for British Columbia to play host to Vancouver Eco Fashion Week (VEFW) — the first fashion week to be dedicated solely to showcasing ethical designers. Featuring runway shows, conferences, and parties galore, it debuts September 28-30.

VEFW is the brainchild of Myriam Laroche, the bilingual “éco-styliste” who runs Myriam’s Closet to dress television personalities and others in need of style assistance in the latest and greatest in eco-fashion. With a wardrobe full of organic, fair trade, recycled, vintage, and sustainable fashion, she’s setting out to prove that you can look good and do good simultaneously.

And that seems to be the theme of Canadian fashion in 2010. In this issue, we explore the many ways that Canada is producing some of the most provocative yet wearable fashion — and whipping up a controversy once in a while.

First, Madison noticed that Canada is rich in natural resources but doesn’t have easily farmed land. That might be why so many Canadian designers have gotten creative with recycled textiles.

You may have heard about a European Union ban on Canadian seal fur coming from the controversial annual seal hunt. But what you may not have heard is what the ban means for the Canadian Inuit hunters who rely on selling the pelts to provide for their communities. If you want to learn something new today, check it out.

Sometimes it seems like Canada’s main export is talent for Hollywood, and we have to give a round of applause to these celebrities who use their fame to bring the spotlight on a variety of environmental and social issues.

Craving more Canada? You can always check out Seam Ripper, a compilation of stories from the Behind the Seams archive.