Catskill Couture: MLE's Sustainable Fashion

Transcript by Jerome Kazlauskas

[00:00:00] Emily Li Mandri: It is interesting having a fashion brand in Upstate New York, especially, you know, the contrast between living essentially in the forest and then having the space in the village, which I'm very grateful for.

[00:00:17] Brett Barry: Next week, fashion designers and buyers, celebrities, influencers, and the international media descend on Manhattan's West Side for New York Fashion Week, just about two hours north of that hubbub is the studio and retail space for MLE, where founder Emily Li Mandri produces an elegant line of women's accessories, sourcing eco-conscious materials, and outputting small batches and custom orders for fashionistas in New York, L.A., and right here in the Catskills. Stay tuned for our conversation with Emily and assistant Kiana in Saugerties, New York, right after this.

[00:00:58] Campbell Brown: "Kaatscast" is supported by... The Mountain Eagle, covering Delaware, Greene, and Schoharie counties, including brands for the local region such as the Windham Weekly, Schoharie News, Cobleskill Herald, and Catskills Chronicle. For more information, call (518) 763-6854 or email: mountaineaglenews@gmail.com; and by Briars & Brambles Books, the go-to independent book and gift store in the Catskills, located in Windham, New York, right next to the pharmacy, just steps away from the Windham Path. Open daily! For more information, visit briarsandbramblesbooks.com or call (518) 750-8599.

[00:01:41] Emily Li Mandri: Hi everyone, my name is Emily Li Mandri. I'm the designer of MLE. We are a women's accessories brand based in Saugerties, New York, in the Catskills, and we are in our studio today, which is on Partition Street. It's in 32 Partition. It's a co-working space; a renovated church that they turned into different office spaces and we have our production space in here, so we have a huge cutting table, we have a jewelry bench, we have a lot of industrial sewing machines. I'm here today with my studio assistant, Kiana, who's helping me.

[00:02:13] Brett Barry: What's your history with design and fashion?

[00:02:16] Emily Li Mandri: So I previously had a fashion line right out of college. It started out as a silkscreen t-shirt line and then morphed into a women's ready-to-wear line that I was doing wholesale for Urban Outfitters, but before that, I mean, I'd always been interested in the visual arts. I had a background in painting, fine arts, and I'm coming from a long line in terms of my family, different generations of creatives, seamstresses, tailors, jewelry makers...

[00:02:47] Brett Barry: From Italy.

[00:02:48] Emily Li Mandri: From Italy and Armenia. Yep, so my grandparents were both tailors and seamstresses, and I learned a lot of my sewing from my grandmother. She wouldn't let me use her industrial machine, but I got to watch what she was doing, and I learned from her that way... my uncles are on my mom's side... my Armenian uncles were stone setters in the Garment District when they came here from Iran, and I have some jewelry that I inherited from them, and that's been a big inspiration for me as well.

[00:03:20] Brett Barry: Terms like fast fashion and eco-consciousness would have been foreign to Emily's relatives when they worked in this business, but the apparel industry today is notoriously wasteful. Pumping out a non-stop flow of cheap, throw away clothing at a tremendous cost to the environment, and to the health and well-being of garment industry workers in developing nations. Assistant Kiana Duggan-Haas studied sustainable costume design as a theater student at SUNY New Paltz. And so, fresh out of college, I asked if she could give an overview of the subject.

[00:03:56] Kiana Duggan-Haas: Well, the short answer is that there are people who may get their whole career to talk about sustainability and sustainability in fashion, so there's a lot... there is a lot going on there, but we all wear clothes, so you can think that you sort of don't care about fashion, but it does affect everyone's life: how clothing is made, how it's marketed to us, all of that affects our day-to-day life. Over the years, it has become increasingly common to buy your clothing in, like, really mass-produced ways and to be very removed from the production process of what you're wearing. Prices are going down, and to bring those prices down, companies are cutting costs in the materials that they're using in underpaying their workers, so that leads to processes that are not as good for the environment, not as good for the local community where the thing is being made, or the thing is being sold... all of the different facets of what... what you say when you mean sustainability... needing to be sustainable for the people and for the planet and for like the future of the world, and all of those aspects are important.

[00:05:09] Brett Barry: Sustainability wasn't so much a topic of discussion in founder Emily Li Mandri's college years, but an experience in her early career turned out to be a revelation and an inspiration for a new way of thinking about and producing clothing.

[00:05:25] Emily Li Mandri: What's interesting, I guess, about doing this whole thing is sustainability wasn't really talked about when I was in school and creating things. I mean, I started to experience it just firsthand when I was doing production when I was... silkscreen t-shirts for my line or I was doing women's ready-to-wear. I remember... I had to order hundreds of yards of fabric that were custom-made. It is a print I had designed. The fabric came. We cut all the fabric out at the factory, and then there were scraps, which I had never witnessed this before, and... and then I was wondering, "What do they do with the straps?" They throw them out. All those scraps get thrown out, and just thinking about... I'm just this one small company back then... had this one order, you know, for the Urban Outfitters for like 200 or so pieces, and I... and I'm feeling guilty about my scraps... what about every other fashion company and what are they doing with their scraps, and then, you know, I just started to think about it more as my business was growing, and especially with clothing, you worry about sizing and fit issues, and that's the number one reason for returns that... to me, influenced why I decided to do accessories in terms of, I knew I wanted to do something in fashion, but a more sustainable option for me was accessories because I didn't have to worry as much about sizing, and I didn't have to worry about having bloated inventory, you know, different sizing, and then worry about how it's going to fit on the customer, and then thinking about when you're doing production runs now like our scraps, I just had a conversation with Kiana. We cut out this one little piece for a bag and we had some a handful of scraps, and I said, "Do we throw these scraps out?" And we decided, "No, we're gonna put them in this box," so we keep all our scraps. We don't even throw anything out, you know, and that's something... again, we're like our... the size of our company versus other companies or fast fashion brands... what are they doing with their scraps? So, the materials we're using, it's a lot of upcycled materials, eco-friendly materials, recycled materials, all the fabrics we source from the Garment District, so they're leftover fabric from other designers from their production runs. All the jewelry we make, we are using recycled metals, so that means the casting companies we work with... they actually melt down scraps and we use those scraps to make our pieces, and besides that, we're also making hair clips overseas and we use cellulose acetate for that, so that's a plant-based material that's laser cut and hand shaped, and what I love about that material is it's a more eco-friendly alternative to the typical petroleum-based plastic. When you acquire something, thinking about that role, it's going to play in your life and the idea of you're acquiring it for the long-term, it's not something you're quickly going to discard, so thinking about investing in, you know, a piece that is high quality, well-made, designed to last, thinking about what the impact is on the environment by you purchasing that and by environment doesn't necessarily have to mean planet earth, it can also mean... who is being hired, who is, you know, being paid to make these pieces for you, is it just socially, is it a responsible decision? It's very complicated nowadays... when you're buying something, thinking about who made this, where they paid fairly, is this piece I'm buying, is this going to last, or am I going to wash it once, it's going to fall apart, and then... then is it more work for me to take care of versus like knowing up front, it's a high quality piece, and it's going to... to last my... rest of my life.

[00:08:51] Brett Barry: I asked Emily if she could illustrate that point through a single product, say, "a handbag."

[00:08:57] Emily Li Mandri: Just with handbags, thinking about the hardware that goes into a handbag, it's usually the hardware, can be the most expensive part of a handbag, so zippers are very expensive, and that tends to be in terms of fast fashion where brands cut corners, so if you're having a problem with the zipper as soon as you get this item, I mean, that's a clear sign that this is not well-made, also what's going on inside the bag, so a lot of linings and interfacings, things that are put in there to reinforce the bag, especially in areas where it's going to be stressed, areas where like a clasp is being closed or a closure is snapping to make sure that this piece is going to last a long time, and that's not necessarily something you can see, but I can guarantee you that these fast fashion brands are not putting that kind of care into the structure of what this... this handbag is, and just also just the fabric, you know, a lot of fast fashion, it's designed to be worn, you know, a handful of times and then it falls. It literally falls apart. The fabric gets runs in it. I mean, a lot of fabric nowadays for fast fashion, they're using rayon, which sounds like a good idea, but rayon is very problematic in terms of the care. When you wash it, it shrinks. It's very fragile. You rub against it and the fibers just, you know, become puffy and stick out from the fabric, so it's a huge headache. It might look beautiful and shiny and flat when you're first looking at it, but then the more you work with this material, it's just, you know, it's... so anytime I see rayon, I just... I'm like, stay away, so that's handbags in terms of jewelry. I mean, fast fashion jewelry tends to be a base metal, and base metal means a non-precious metal, like usually, it's brass or even zinc. Sometimes it could just be an amalgam of something that, you know, we don't even know what it is, but probably has lead in it or other things in it... nickel... things that cause allergic reactions that you wouldn't really know unless you put it on... a lot of these fast fashion brands, it's not even labeled if it's hypoallergenic or not, you just buy it for the look, and again, you wear it once or twice, so it's like, "Okay, my ears are getting red and irritated," but whatever the... the earring has already corroded. I'm throwing it out. You know, so our pieces, we make sure that they're all hypoallergenic. They don't have any nickel in them... any lead in them... we're making sure that if we're using a base metal like brass, we're doing a very thick layer of plating on top, and 14 karat gold or platinum [like a real precious metal] to make sure that piece lasts, and a lot of times with fast fashion, they're just doing this quick dip, so you get the color, the tone, but it's going to come off really quickly.

[00:11:32] Brett Barry: Like, if you could characterize your clientele, who is that woman?

[00:11:36] Emily Li Mandri: Yeah, so she is someone that is sophisticated, elegant... she's a world traveler... she likes dressing up... she likes going to brunch... she is a chic, fabulous woman. Our piece is, we say, "Statement accessories for the modern gentlewoman." It's the idea of it's someone that's elevated, elegant, but she's not afraid to make a statement. She likes our pieces because they are unique, they're a bit whimsical, but it's also something you can still wear it every day to upgrade your look.

[00:12:10] Brett Barry: And I would imagine that because you're using scraps and things that cast-offs from other larger runs that... that what you're making is limited, and when you run out, it moves into a different fabric or a different color if you can't rely on custom product.

[00:12:26] Emily Li Mandri: Yeah, so that happens all the time. We create a bag or... or a scrunchie or a sleep mask and it's a certain style and then it becomes a top seller, but then you realize, "Oh, I can't source that fabric anymore," and then you have to come with another iteration. It forces you to keep innovating, which is cool, but then at the same time, it is a bit difficult and can be challenging, especially when you find something that becomes very popular and has high demand.

[00:12:51] Brett Barry: When we come back, living, designing, and working in the Catskills.

[00:12:57] Campbell Brown: This episode is supported by Hanford Mills Museum. Explore the power of the past as knowledgeable staff guide you through the mill with demonstrations of the waterwheel, sawmill, and woodworking machines. For more information about scheduling a tour or about their 2024 exploration days, visit hanfordmills.org.

[00:13:14] Brett Barry: And while we're on the topic of fashion, check out our new "Kaatscast" t-shirts in a wide range of colors and sizes and made-to-order to eliminate waste. You pick the color, we'll pay the shipping. See them all at kaatscast.com/store. Back at MLE, I asked Emily Li Mandri how she came to settle in the Catskills and what it's been like to develop her brand here.

[00:13:47] Emily Li Mandri: I had been coming upstate on the weekends with my husband when we were living in the city. We were living in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and we were in an apartment that didn't have any outdoor area. We were right above a bar that basically every time you opened your window, cigarette smoke would come in. We heard the subway every seven minutes, the whole apartment would shake, so it's getting to the point where we were just craving outdoor space. Craving just to have our own space, and the house that we ended up in... in Saugerties, actually, we just picked it because it was so remote and secluded. You couldn't even see your neighbors from the street. It was just very peaceful, completely different experience from what we were going through in the city, and it wasn't until after we bought our house moved in that we actually saw what the downtown area was like, and we were very pleased to see that there was this really cute village. You know, we have a movie theater, we have really amazing shops... I now have a shop in Saugerties on Main Street, which has been awesome, so it worked out really well for us. When I launched my brand, I launched it with Instagram ads because that was my background going into it, and we were targeting women between the ages of 18 to 44 in metropolitan areas across the U.S., so that being said, "I have a big following in New York City, but I also have a big following on the West Coast in L.A. especially," and it's been interesting now operating in Saugerties because while the majority of my customers are all over the U.S., I am starting to build a following here in Saugerties, which is really exciting. I've done a few local markets, like Field + Supply in Kingston, and what's been exciting about that is that the people I meet there, they connect with the brand and they reach back out. I've had multiple customers email me afterwards that they want to order something else or they've come into the store, so it does feel like I am building a base here, and the new store that I just opened on Main Street in Saugerties, I've partnered with another brand called "Chambers Vintage," and Kim, the owner of Chambers Vintage, has a very big local following, so that's been really amazing to be able to partner with her and expand the local awareness for my brand. It is interesting having a fashion brand in Upstate New York, especially, you know, the contrast between, you know, living essentially in the forest and then having the space in the village, which I'm very grateful for to have that... that balance of, you know, that space to just take a breath and... and relax and step back and just reflect and meditate on things, and then being able to have a space to work. I mean, that's something in this... when I lived in the city, I didn't have that kind of space available, and you need a lot of space when you're doing, especially when you're doing production to really spread out, and I mean, in terms of, you know, finding a team up here, it... it has been a bit difficult, but the thing is there are very talented creatives here. We're all just in the woods and it just takes time, you know, meeting each other, finding out who's here to connect, and there are, again, so many talented, amazing people up here that are willing, you know, to work with you and to work hard and believe in your vision, and that's been really cool to find them.

[00:17:01] Brett Barry: People like her assistant, New Paltz grad Kiana Duggan-Haas.

[00:17:05] Kiana Duggan-Haas: I actually visited the studio on the Saugerties Artists Tour, and Emily was hiring at the time, so I saw all of the things that she was making, and I was very curious about them, and all of her interest and her focus in sustainability, which is really important to me, especially in the fashion industry, in everything we wear. Let's see if... if I can be helpful here. Emily has been very helpful and supportive of me learning on the job as well, which I'm really grateful for.

[00:17:42] Brett Barry: At a sewing machine in the corner of the studio, I asked Emily what her grandmother would have thought about her career in fashion.

[00:17:50] Emily Li Mandri: She passed away about five years ago at this point, she had Alzheimer's, so towards the end of her life, she didn't really recognize what was happening, so unfortunately, as I was getting into this, she was becoming less cognizant of what was going on, but growing up, she was actually very against me doing this as a trade. I think it was part of, you know, you know, I'm a first-generation American, so the idea of, you know, having a more quote-unquote-like, educated job—being a doctor or a lawyer or something, you know, that is more, I guess, socially acceptable versus doing something like this, which for some reason, I guess, she was in her mind thinking it's not skilled labor, but this is actually very skilled to be able to sew.

[00:18:41] Brett Barry: See the MLE collection next time you're in Saugerties or visit online at madebymle.com. Be sure to subscribe to "Kaatscast: The Catskills Podcast" wherever you get your podcasts for a new story every two weeks. Next time, we're talking cauliflower with historian Diane Galusha. Until then, visit us at kaatscast.com, where you can subscribe to our newsletter, submit feedback, or grab one of those striking new "Kaatscast" t-shirts. Thanks to our production intern, Juliana Merchant, for her help with this episode and to our transcriptionist, Jerome Kazlauskas. I'm Brett Barry. Thanks for listening.

[00:19:32] Campbell Brown: "Kaatscast" is supported by a generous grant from the Nicholas J. Juried Family Foundation, and by listeners like you! If you'd like to make a donation, you can do so at kaatscast.com. Thank you!