Meet Veganologie: The Story Behind Dubai’s First Vegan Accessories Brand
Homegrown and planet-friendly, this vegan brand is the brainchild of a female-led team
Sustainable and cruelty-free fashion is becoming more and more important to consumers worldwide and according to Angana Maheshwari, the founder of new Dubai-based accessories brand Veganologie, the Middle East is no different. The label produces handbags, wallets, and credit card cases from fully recycled, vegan materials. Even the hardware, where used, is sustainable – produced from fully recyclable zinc alloy.
“The Dubai customer is absolutely ready for more sustainable products. Even though we ship globally, we know that consumers in our home base are just as eager for planet-friendly products as they are elsewhere in the world,” explains Angana. “One positive outcome of the pandemic has been that people everywhere have made conscious choices to live in a healthier way, both for themselves and the planet.”
Angana saw a gap in the market during the pandemic when she struggled to find a bag that ticked all the eco-friendly boxes she required. Uncomfortable with the idea of fast fashion and the amount of waste it creates, she decided to spend lockdown researching how she could make an earth-friendly bag of her own. The result is a collection of well thought-out and fun accessories, with prices starting at $50 (Dhs183) – incredibly reasonable for vegan products, which can be expensive to source and produce.
“It was important to me that we offer the highest-quality materials possible, and sourcing the right, high-quality ones was quite a process,” remembers Angana, a graduate of New York University and the London School of Economics. “It was really important to me that the material not only feel rich, like real leather, but it also had to be durable. It’s incredible how much material is perfect when it’s a flat piece but it’s another story altogether when it becomes rendered into a 3-D handbag.”
We know that consumers in our home base of Dubai are just as eager for Planet-friendly products as they are elsewhere in the world
She eventually settled on recycled plastics and the brand launched online last November. “Everything in the Veganologie collection is made from 100 per cent recycled materials, except for the hardware on the bags, and the entire bag is recyclable,” tells Angana. “Our cross-body bags are made from 11 plastic bottles, wallets are made from four plastic bottles and cardholders are made from two plastic bottles. I’m very proud of the fact that we received important certifications from GRS (Global Recycling Standard) and PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) which attest to our transparency and hard work in making Veganologie cruelty-free and sustainable.” The brand’s bold and boxy designs, that come in a palette perfect for colour blocking, are the work of Sara Basar, who joined Veganologie as executive director and designer, having previously worked in design houses in Italy and Turkey before moving to the UAE to work at Rami Al Ali’s Dubai atelier.
“It was important that the bags and wallets have luxury details while also being highly functional for women on the go,” explains Sara, who is of Albanian, Syrian and Turkish heritage. “There are zippered pockets inside and outside for mobile phones, work IDs and other important items that often get lost inside handbags, and there are internal key straps for optimal organisation. Every bag incorporates some element of Veganologie’s logo – the Monstera leaf, which in the East symbolises longevity and respect, which perfectly sums up Veganologie’s brand ethos.”
And Sara is keen to reduce the brand’s carbon footprint by bringing manufacturing to the UAE. “One of the challenges was finding the factories that could work with sustainable materials, not all of them do. We scoured the globe and investigated factories in 14 countries, from Mexico to Vietnam and everything in between. We really wanted to produce the bags in the UAE but the factories here aren’t yet able to work with sustainable materials, which we hope will change soon.”
And Angana has plans for future products too: “I’d love to expand the brand with a men’s collection as well as to offer some unisex pieces,” she shares. “Tote bags or laptop bags are also on the drawing board. Exciting new vegan leathers are being developed all the time and it would be fantastic to create an exotic collection using apple, cactus, mushroom, or even orange-skin vegan leathers in the near future.”
The collection is available, with free global shipping, exclusively through www.veganologie.com.
Lead image caption credits: The Gemma is the brand’s transitional day-to-night bag
From Harper’s Bazaar Arabia’s March 2022 issue.