DUBAI // Clothes made of bamboo and camel-milk soap are among the products on offer at an exhibition promoting environmentally friendly lifestyles.
Future Green 2012 will gather about 30 companies, many of them small businesses and start-ups, at Dubai’s Marina Mall to display goods with a sustainable message today and tomorrow.
Now in its third year, the event’s success is proof that attitudes in the region are changing, according to Tatiana Antonelli Abella, the co-founder and managing director of the event organiser, Goumbook.
“Consumers are much more aware, they no longer doubt a green lifestyle is possible here,” Ms Abella said. “In three years, there has been a huge difference.”
Shirley Conlon, an Irish expatriate, launched a locally made, all natural skincare line, Shirley Conlon Organics, last year.
Formerly a brand manager for a high-range cosmetics brand, Mrs Conlon always wanted to make her own range of products.
Making cosmetics in the UAE is “quite complicated”, she said, and her products must undergo more rigorous testing than they would in Europe. Her advice to women is to consider carefully the ingredients lists of products.
“If you cannot pronounce, you are not going to eat it or put it on your skin”, she said.
Bambootique specialises in clothes made from bamboo.
“The fabric keeps you cool in the heat. I do not think people realise how soft it is,” said Reim El Houni, the company’s managing director.
South AfricanStevi Lowmass, who makes soap from olive oil, “a tiny bit of bees’ wax” and camel milk, will also be at the exhibition.
"Increasingly, people are looking for natural products," she said.
vtodorova@thenational.ae
