February 29, 2008

Kenneth Cole launches his own Huffington Post

If you thought fashion people were all shallow, insecure decadents obsessed with aesthetics and themselves, then you were right. Mostly.
Shoe-meister man Kenneth Cole, however, can claim to possess a smidgen of social conscience. Not only does he feature two very well-heeled lesbians and their cute kid on the homepage of his website, he has started the AWEARNESS Blog, which looks like his socially-conscious answer to the Huffington Post.
"I have been a reasonably successful, designer, businessman, parent, and philanthropist but I've always been a frustrated activist," he writes in his mission statement. "This venting arena is the perfect venue for personal expression and for encouraging genuine change (not to mention taking some of the pressure off of my pharmacologist)."
His contributors' list is certainly worthy—one writer is an acquaintance of mine named Sam Slovic, a noted L.A. writer who exposed the reality of the many homeless people living in L.A.'s Skid Row. Also on board is David Hershkovits, co-founder of Paper magazine. He has posted three blogs so far, one about the upcoming Earth Hour (at 8PM on March 29, millions of people around the world will turn off their electricity and work it cave-man style for an hour.) Oh, and "Good" magazine founder Ben Goldhirsh and singer KT Tunstall are contributors too. I especially enjoyed a recent blog post on Islamofacism by the turban-wearing Sonny Caberwal (pictured), who starred in a Kenneth Cole advertising campaign.

Kenneth himself contributed a thoughtful piece on whether we should control how skinny American models should be, as is the case on the Spanish runway. "I'm not big on imposing my perspective on others," he says, "But I think we, the industry, all view these models (on and off the runway) as role models that we've created, and should carefully consider the message they are sending to our children."
Aside from a story about a dress made from condoms and the anorexic model debate, there is surprisingly little fashion coverage on the blog thus far. So, Kenneth, I look forward to more posts about the green fashion movement—fashion is, after all, one of the least environmentally-friendly industries on the planet (it takes hundreds of gallons of water to create just one pair of jeans).

February 29, 2008 in MEN | Permalink