British Designers Get Together to Create Nonmedical Face Coverings

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LONDON — The British Fashion Council has corralled some of London’s most prominent names to design sustainable and reusable nonmedical face coverings.

The organization will manufacture and retail the face coverings internationally as part of the project “Great British Designer Face Coverings: Reusable, for People and Planet.” The aim is to raise one million pounds, with all the proceeds split between NHS Charities Together COVID-19 Urgent Appeal, BFC Foundation Fashion Fund and Wings of Hope Children’s Charity.

Participating brands include Halpern, Raeburn, Mulberry, Rixo, Julien Macdonald and Liam Hodges, who have added their own creative touch to the face coverings: Macdonald’s features a snake print, Christopher Raeburn added his “Raeuse” sustainability logo to the mask, while Rixo’s covering features an illustration of a swallow.

The ethical label Bags of Ethics will manufacture the face coverings, with no single-use plastic, at its partner factories.

“Since the early 2000s, we helped supermarkets and retailers reduce their single-use plastic bag consumption by five-plus billion units through sustainable and reusable bags. A new challenge arises with the coronavirus pandemic. Our aim is to manufacture high-quality, reusable nonmedical face coverings for the public, which reduces stigma through great British design,” said Bags of Ethics chairman Dr. R. Sri Ram.

The face coverings will retail for 15 pounds for a set of three and be available to purchase from the BFC web site, at select supermarkets and across major U.K. retailers such as Asos, Boots, John Lewis & Partners and Sainsbury’s.

The launch follows guidance from the U.K. government advising the public to wear nonmedical face coverings — which do not protect the wearer but stop them from passing on the virus if they are pre-symptomatic or asymptotic — in enclosed spaces. As of Thursday, face coverings have also been made mandatory in public transport across the U.K.

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