Krishna

The Bramblewood Farm Sessions

Krishna — Mon, 06 Jan 2020 03:55:50 +0000

The post The Bramblewood Farm Sessions appeared first on .

Who the hell is Tiarnie?

Krishna — Mon, 23 Sep 2019 07:42:18 +0000

Sydney’s latest music sensation is a girl, her guitar and band playing infectiously melodic rock’n’roll riffs against powerfully visceral lyrics. Singer-songwriter Tiarnie embodies raw, honest storytelling with heart-bursting emotion. We all have tracks that define moments in our lives. It’s a playlist comprising songs that have touched our hearts at just the right times and brought us to our knees, fist pumped in gratitude for the recognition of our pleasure and pain. This fresh-faced twentysomething is already wise beyond her years. She has lived a lifetime in her songs that perfectly unite kick-arse melodies with rock’n’roll attitude. She sings of our life and she plays it loud. Who the hell is Tiarnie? To us, she is the muse for our Love Shack Music Club collection of handloom throws. Just like her songs, our throws are unique, raw and irresistibly appealing with an outdoor festival-friendly vibe to take you through a summer of making musical memories and beyond. Discover more about Tiarnie on Instagram @tiarniemusic

The post Who the hell is Tiarnie? appeared first on .

Our king-sized blankets are here!

Krishna — Thu, 11 Apr 2019 08:37:17 +0000

Kalai's king-sized bkankets are here!

The post Our king-sized blankets are here! appeared first on .

Soap nuts: the lowdown

Krishna — Sat, 17 Nov 2018 10:39:40 +0000

Soap nuts – what in the blazes are they? Here’s the lowdown. They’re the pretty amazing fruit of the Sapindus Mukorossi tree, which is part of the lychee family. Why are these berries so awesome? They are a totally natural, chemical-free, completely biodegradable way to wash your clothes! And we highly recommend washing your Ayurvastra Avani towels with them to preserve the life of the medicinal plant infusions in the organic cotton towels. Soap nuts are actually berries that contain a natural detergent called saponin which is extracted when agitated or heated in hot water, creating soap-like suds. Since they are completely natural and highly sustainable, they are kind to the skin and to the planet. We’re giving away soap nut samples with every sale of our Avani collection of Ayurvastra towels. Find out more about them by checking out this post at 1 Million Women for the pros and cons about soap nuts and this five-minute video for how useful soap nuts can be.

The post Soap nuts: the lowdown appeared first on .

Kalai supports Surf for Life

Krishna — Sat, 20 Oct 2018 10:50:47 +0000

Kalai is now proud to announce we are supporting Surf for Life, a youth program aimed at improving future prospects for at-risk kids in Gisborne, New Zealand, through surfing. It’s a program that resonates with us on a couple of levels. First because my partner is a surfer who was born and raised in Gisborne, and we have family there. And second, because we did the same thing for kids in Cuba, and we know how powerful this kind of program can be, given the support. You can read about our Cuban experience here. As you know, Kalai was started with the ethos of working to support humanity and the planet, and when we started this business, it was always with the intention of giving back to society in some way. We recently travelled to Gisborne on the pristine east coast of the north island of New Zealand to visit family. While we were there we learnt of the Surf for Life program run by Gisborne Boardriders. While Gisborne’s coastline is arguably unrivalled in its rugged beauty and abundance of awesome waves, the amount of kids whose lives are enriched by their surroundings is much less than you would expect. Beneath Gisborne’s beautiful surface lie some serious social issues: economic inequality, alcohol and drug problems and anti-social behaviour. The youth is especially affected and has the country’s highest rate of risk for poor outcomes, including jail time. Recognising the need to break this cycle, the club’s surfing development manager Florian Bub created the Surf for Life program to uplift school-aged children through surfing, as well as contribute positively to the Gisborne community. So between now and April 2019, we are backing Flo’s crusade by donating 10 percent of sales from our Love Shack Surf Club collection of organic cotton blankets to the Surf for Life program to give Gisborne’s at-risk youth the chance for a healthier future through surfing. The money will help the program, which relies heavily on volunteers and donations, to buy surfboards and wetsuits, stage comps and keep the program going to help as many kids as possible and, by turn, benefit the community at large. We’ll write more about the program and how its going in future posts, so stay tuned!

The post Kalai supports Surf for Life appeared first on .

Our new range of blankets are here!

Krishna — Tue, 07 Aug 2018 12:11:22 +0000

Great news – our new range of blankets are here! And just in time for the warmer weather. Our Love Shack Surf Club range of blankets was conceived by us and ethically created by talented artisans in Rajasthan. Made from three layers of organic cotton, these dohar-style blankets are block-printed by hand, and we couldn’t be happier with how they’ve turned out. They’re available in our online store now and at the ethical retail hub The Green Street Collective. After some helpful customer feedback, we’ve got two sizes this time: 210cm x 210cm (queen size) and our original 150cm x 200cm. Both are perfect for the bedroom, beach, picnicking – however you choose to use it. Our Love Shack Surf Club blankets will keep on giving year-round: they’re perfect over those hot summer nights when you just need breathable cover without too much warmth, and from autumn to winter for extra warmth. We’re partial to a bonfire, summer or winter, and our Love Shack Surf Club blankets are perfect for wrapping up with the ones you love and watching the flames as the sun comes up. In earthy tones of mustard and khaki, marine shades of blue and white, contrasting grey and red, and summery shades of watermelon with beautiful boho style, our Love Shack Surf Club blankets will saturate your world with colour and pattern. Join the club!

The post Our new range of blankets are here! appeared first on .

Fashion a change for our planet

Krishna — Sat, 28 Apr 2018 10:06:40 +0000

The importance of supporting sustainable, ethical fashion has never been more imperative than it is now. The future of our planet and our species depends on it. I may sound dramatic, but let me give you some context. I’m currently midway through and online course called Fashion and Sustainability: Understanding Luxury Fashion in a Changing World. It’s free – check it out even, if you only have a passing interest in the issues of sustainability, you won’t regret it. So far, for me it has been eye-opening, frightening, inspiring and motivating all at once. But there’s no message clearer than the importance for us all, as consumers, to make conscious choices about what and how we consume in all areas of our lives. It’s how we are going to force the change that we desperately need. I am diligent about looking at food packaging for ingredients, origin and nutritional value, and even the packaging itself when doing my groceries. And on top of that whether it fits into my family budget. All these factors dictate whether I buy that item for my family. I continually question how much of an impact will me buying an item have on my world and that around me? So it’s not only the monetary cost that concerns me. Fashion should be no different, for all of us. A dress should be worth much more than $25 to us. Consider the journey of that dress. The farmers of the raw material, the weavers of the fibre, the dyeing of the fabric, the designer of the dress, the people involved in its assembly, the transport to get from where it was created to where you see it. I think we’d all agree, all that costs way more than $25, and even more so in terms of the cost of the planet’s resources. A startling fact I recently learnt is that it takes 2,700 liters of water to make just one t-shirt. That is enough for one person to drink for 900 days. It’s a heartbreaking reality when 11 percent of the world’s population lives with water stress, and often it’s in these regions that our fashion is created. And even more shocking, is that it takes 20,000 litres to create one pair of jeans. I’m not suggesting we should stop buying cotton T-shirts or jeans, fashion to humans is as essential as food and water. I only suggest that we all start putting more thought into what we buy, where it came from, what it’s made of and how much we really need. Kalai’s shop stocks only ethically and sustainably made products created by hand. Consume consciously. The survival of our planet depends upon it.

The post Fashion a change for our planet appeared first on .

Join the Fashion Revolution

Krishna — Sat, 21 Apr 2018 09:37:36 +0000

April 24, 2018 marks the fifth anniversary of one of the largest industrial disasters in human history. The collapse of the Rana Plaza complex in Bangladesh, where factory workers were crammed into structurally unsafe buildings to manufacture garments for some of the world’s biggest fashion brands, claimed 1138 lives and injured more than 2500 factory workers. The victims were mainly young women. It was the wake-up call that we shouldn’t have needed, but it became the long-overdue catalyst for a revolution. Fashion Revolution Week begins April 23 and has in the five years since its inception by UK fashion designers, Carry Somers and Orsola de Castro, become the largest fashion activism movement in the world. Fashion Revolution Day, April 24, will commemorate the day of the heartbreaking disaster, but globally, for the whole week we are urged to ask, “who makes my clothes?”. Transparency is the first step towards change and since Fashion Revolution began, a real revolution is gaining rapid momentum. We are all consumers of fashion. Like food and shelter it’s a necessity. We are also custodians of this planet. Make Fashion Revolution Week your springboard to greater awareness about how, what, where and by who the clothes you wear are made. Check out Fashion Revolution and learn more about the #whomademyclothes campaign that runs over the week. Be part of the change for fashion that values the safety of people, the planet and profits all equally and fairly.

The post Join the Fashion Revolution appeared first on .

Our story – Part Two

Krishna — Fri, 09 Feb 2018 11:24:12 +0000

Kalai is a brand driven by the need for social and environmental change. One of our foundation stones was laid in Cuba in 2011 when we became startlingly aware of the global need to save our oceans from widespread pollution. You can read that blog – Our Story – Part One – here and watch the movie we made documenting our journey. The second foundation stone of Kalai is my mother’s legacy. She was tirelessly selfless in all aspects of her life, a woman determined to better the lives of others. My name is Krishna and together with my partner Blair and our son Kahali, we are Kalai. I was born in south India and grew up in London. At the start of the 70s, my parents left behind the security of family and all that they knew to seek better opportunities in a city that was socially, culturally, economically and even geographically so far away from anything they had ever known. Just as many immigrants did in those days, my father worked day and night to establish some roots for my brother and I. My mother, a scientist, who studied marine biology, did whatever she could to make ours a happy home life. She wore every hat from microbiologist to teacher and checkout lady at the local ASDA store to ensure our future was safe. A speaker of seven languages, later in life, she was an advocate and interpreter for Asian refugees, travelling to courtrooms and hospital wards all over the city to translate for those who were struggling to find their place in a strange land, just as she once did. To me she embodied all that it is to be a goddess – beauty, strength, nurturing, selflessness, kindness. She had a motto that she lived by: “never do harm by word or deed” – and that simple message resonates with me always. On visiting India again for the first time at the age of seven I was a fully-fledged Londoner. I witnessed such confusing and confronting contrasts: poverty and enterprise; starvation and resourcefulness; the haves and the have-nots. I didn’t understand any of it, but it’s everything my mother knew all about and she did whatever she could to ease suffering, whether financially or, on any given evening, simply by taking the uneaten food cooked at home and dishing it out to those on the streets who were starving. India, to me now is a sea of beautiful faces, an ocean of kind hearts, a deep well of rich culture, and ancient and valuable skills that should be preserved and practised, yet its people still struggle. Kalai is now my chance to give back, to humanity, to the environment… to my mother. Kalai not only employs the artisan skills of women in the southern Indian state of Kerala, a region on the shore of the Arabian Sea, our products will also be produced out of a centre run by the Kansas/Indian-based non-profit organisation Lions in Four Foundation, using natural dyes, organic textiles and unique processes. It is our mutual purpose to empower women to help end the cycle poverty. We have set out to contribute to sustainability and promote ethical manufacturing, which means the women at the centre are educated in textile skills, they are paid a fair and livable wage and are treated respectfully. With these skills, the women will have the power to give their children a future that includes an education, and later jobs that will value them, as any human being has the right to expect.

The post Our story – Part Two appeared first on .

Our Story – Part One

Krishna — Thu, 25 Jan 2018 07:27:41 +0000

Our Story – Part one, We all have a story to tell, a starting point that inspired us to become what we are today, what we do today and what we teach our kids for their future. Ours is just like everyone else’s, but with just a little twist. It’s a story of a far away island. It’s a story of robbery, CIA espionage. It’s a story of a small family with a 15-month-old baby taking on a world superpower, a communist regime and winning for both surfing and ocean conservation. This story is the foundation for a big part of what Kalai stands for today. To break it down, we went to Cuba in 2011 to get more kids in the ocean to experience the magic of surfing, and we left a month later with a passion for cleaning up our oceans and the environment. In 2012 we made a short film summarising what that trip taught us and how it changed us…

The post Our Story – Part One appeared first on .