Rather than utilizing traditional plastic-based vegan leather, or ‘pleather’, in its products, the vegan fashion brand Samara has dedicated itself to using an eco-friendly alternative.
Those apple peels that many people discard of? Samara is using them to create a vegan leather alternative that’s fashionable and friendly. The small Toronto-based brand recycles the apple peels from the juicing industry, further contributing to the zero-waste movement as well.
Samara also avoids the use of polyvinyl chloride, or PVC, which is often used in the making of traditional faux-leather. While technically vegan in nature, PVC is harmful to the environment.
In a recent post on Instagram, the brand stated, “We tried creating our own plant-based leathers (in our kitchen sometimes) and experimented with coconut and pineapple too. Then we found that Apple leather could look exactly like real leather, and if you mix it with a little bit of PU, it was durable too.”
Led by a team of two sisters, Samara recently introduced its Mini purse, which is the first fashion piece the brand has made out of their eco-friendly and vegan apple leather. Even though the purses use a bit of polyurethane as a binder, they are much more eco-friendly than pieces made with PVC.
Called the Apple Leather Mini, the purses are available at a price of $50 and in the colors red, black, and blush. To add even further to the brand’s ‘good samaritan’ nature, every purchase through Samara covers the cost of a solar backpack (in collaboration with The Soular Backpack brand) for a child in need in East Africa, so that they can have access to light.
According to the brand’s website, the brand ‘was born out of a need among women for small, minimalist purses and wallets that were not overtly branded, that were truly eco-friendly, not posing any harm to animals, without luxury markups but with the same quality as higher-end brands.’
As the global warming crisis continues to be a pressing matter, we can only hope that other brands will find inspiration in the innovation displayed by Samara.
