Eco warrior Tamasyn Gambell

Originating as a womenswear print designer at H&M, Tamasyn Gambell has found a new approach to the design of scarves, notebooks and homeware products.  

Frustrated with the amount of waste and lack of innovation in both high-end and high-street fashion, Tamasyn decided to set up a company that would strive to produce luxurious designs whilst upholding a responsibility to work in the most environmentally and socially responsible ways available. 

The team, including Tamasyn, has invested a lot of time in finding suppliers who provide eco-friendly products of the highest quality. They believe that style does not have to suffer in order to be environmentally friendly and that designers should all be working with eco-friendly methods without compromising on style or quality. 

Her aim is to challenge people’s perceptions of eco-friendly design and prove that it can be modern and luxurious. She does this by producing a range that consists of a variety of luxury and reclaimed scarves, notebooks and homeware items, which are all produced in the company’s environmentally friendly manner. 

The recycled scarves are sourced from a textile recycling plant near Nottingham, and are each uniquely printed with Tamasyn’s designs. The original pattern of the scarf interacts with the new to form unique and individual one-off print designs.

These silk scarves are woven in India by a cooperative of skilled women who have been trained to weave and use natural dyes sourced from their local environment. This welfare project also provides education, housing and healthcare as well as retraining disadvantaged people. Once the scarves arrive in London, Tamasyn uses a silkscreen process to print the scarves with certified organic dyes and a seaweed-based binder. 

These notebooks are printed by a socially responsible co-operative with green-mark accreditation using 100% consumer waste recycled paper and vegetable oil-based inks. The pages are reject sheets sourced from the printers. 

The homeware designs are produced using Irish linen and screen-printed with water-based pigments. They are sewn in a British factory and, as each one is hand-printed, they are all individually unique. 

Tamasyn has been rewarded for her sustainable business, having won the Cockpit Arts/NADFAS award in 2008, which enabled her to set up her own studio.

The collection can be viewed online by clicking here.

Helena Strutt