Actor, musician, and activist Jaden Smith wants to make luxury luggage more sustainable — and he's cleaning up the oceans to do it.
Smith's eco-minded lifestyle travel brand Harper Collective, which he co-founded with entrepreneur Sebastian Manes, recently launched a sustainable collaboration with popular German luxury fashion house MCM. The result is a planet-positive luggage line made of recycled ocean plastics and deadstock fabric components, as reported by Hypebae.
"The idea is to take a problem that we are all faced with and try to find a useful and sustainable solution," Harper Collective says of the collection on its website.
According to Hypebae, the Harper Collective x MCM luxury luggage collaboration is crafted with 70% recycled ocean plastic, including fishing nets and post-consumer plastic ocean waste. The luggage also features upcycled MCM deadstock fabric in its tags, internal straps, and lining. Hypebae reported that these interior stock components come from three different decades of MCM designs.
Harper Collective x MCM luggage is available in three different sizes: the Cabin and Cabin + Expandable — meant to carry on — and a Large size meant to check. According to MCM, each Cabin bag contains 480 grams of sea plastic and 640 grams of landfill plastic. Each Large bag contains 790 grams of sea plastic and 1.5 kilograms of landfill plastic. The luxury pieces range in price from $1,050 to $1,290.
A CGI video promoting the line, produced by The New Face and conceived by Smith — son of Jada Pinkett-Smith and Will Smith — features surreal artwork by popular Japanese artist Inagaki. In the video, ocean plastic joins and morphs into the luxury luggage designs from the collection. According to Hypebae, the look of the CGI video references the FW 2024 MCM campaign "From Munich to Mars."
Ocean plastic pollution is one of the biggest environmental issues of our time. According to the United Nations, plastic waste makes up about 80% of all marine pollution, with around eight to 10 million tons of plastic ending up in the ocean annually.
Of all marine plastic pollution, about 20% is from discarded fishing gear like fishing nets. If pollution continues at current rates, plastic is expected to outweigh all the fish in the sea by 2050.
Plastic never truly degrades. Instead, it breaks down into harmful microplastics that pollute the air, soil, and water. Recycling and repurposing ocean plastic into useful products helps remove some of this waste from our waterways while also preventing new plastic from being created.
🗣️ Which of these factors would most effectively motivate you to recycle old clothes and electronics?
🔘 Giving me money back 💰
🔘 Letting me trade for new stuff 👕
🔘 Making it as easy as possible ⚡
🔘 Keeping my stuff out of landfills 🗑️
🗳️ Click your choice to see results and speak your mind
"Sustainability is our ultimate goal," MCM chairperson Sung-Joo Kim told Hypebae. "As a leading luxury fashion house, it is our responsibility to do things better for our planet and society."
The Harper Collective x MCM luggage collection is now available on the MCM website and the Harper Collective website.
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