• Circular Economy

The main objective of the circular economy is to increase the life cycle of products and to reduce the overexploitation of resources by increasing their quality, the possibility of being recycled and / or reused, avoiding waste, among other factors.

• Respect the environment / Environmentally friendly textiles

At this time Kalium respects the environment mainly through the reuse of Portuguese production surpluses, so the raw material doesn’t contribute to the footprint. The textile surplus comes from prototypes or productions that may contain small defects (which we get around) that, if not reused, end up in the landfill.

If we choose new textiles, they are organic so that they are produced without chemicals and are not toxic to soils.

For printing, we prefer screen printing because of the quality and durability, but also because the inks are water based, and so a ecologic choice.

• Kalium’s production

Between Fundão and Covilhã

Most of the pieces are produced at Kalium’s atelier, at this time in the Incubadtion “A Praça”, in Fundão. The founder and designer Katia also makes many of the clothes and all zero waste acessoires. From a young age she started sewing, she always enjoyed handcrafts and drawing, and chose to graduate in fashion design. Now she wants to put all her knowledge into practice that she have gained through higher education in fashion design, at an internship at Storytailors, through working as a client manager and coordinator in a production, and through hours and hours of research and work.

Katia does -> Clothing Design, Graphic Design, Modeling, Cutting, Confection, Marketing, Commercial.

Sometimes help is needed and I am fortunate that Beira Interior has many talented people in the area of ​​sewing, which comes from the history of this area.

One of them is Manuela Carvalho, who is also a designer and one of her passions is sewing. Whenever necessary, Manuela manufactures some of the garments.

• Let’s go to the north of Portugal

The knits are mostly made in a small confection in the north of the country, in the Barcelos area. Dona Rosa, who is the founder and manager of Conferoças, is the friendliness in person, who takes care of the confection and her team with attention and passion. I am very grateful that, although it is still such a small and recent brand, I could count on this help.

Printed T-shirts are the only product that is not made in Portugal, in this case, we chose a brand that followed the same values, having the certificate “Fair Wear” (know everything here…). They were printed in Aveiro at Maudlin Merchandise, through the screen printing process.

The reason we do not have these t-shirts produced in Portugal yet, was due to the difficulty in finding here organic cotton T-shirts that could be purchased through a small order. However, we hope to have news soon.

As there are more people involved in Kalium, we also want to introduce:

Photographer: Kevin Cruz

Website Designer and Development: Digitality

• Price transparency

One of the goals is for Kalium’s products to be affordable among slowfashion’s as possible, as we believe that sustainable fashion should be possible for everyone, and being a Portuguese brand, especially for the Portuguese. It may not be perfect for everyone, but we try the best. We believe that instead of buying 5 T-shirts for 10 €, you can buy a sustainable shirt that we like and care for. What we do for a lower cost is the fact that most processes are done in our studio, and the use of surpluses also helps to reduce the price. Physical store prices may be higher, as it takes into account postage, which we give stores as extra margin and may vary by country. We prefer the price to be fair to Kalium, resellers and customers, as purchasing powers also vary from country to country.

Since we both do the production, as we hire seamstresses, the costs may vary slightly, so we find it fairer to exemplify by percentage what are the expenses in the example of a double-necked shirt.