CoinOp

Get ready to dust off that old Vashti vinyl, mentally exit the rainy city of Portland, Oregon and enter those sunny gates of Northern California to take time out for the wandering and harmonious, eco-friendly, fashion line of Pinball’s most recent client, Angelina Rennell!

An independent, self-taught artist and creative entrepreneur, Angelina is based out of Santa Cruz, California. Her creative enterprises include Beklina, an eco-boutique as well as Lina Rennell, the just-launched line of earth conscious, “green glamour”, cosmopolitan apparel. Please join us in a discussion with Angelina regarding environmental commitment, puma-inspiration, and beachy driftwood sentiments…

PB: You captain two creative enterprises, Beklina and Lina Renell. What are your intentions with these two distinct creative pursuits?

AR: Beklina is an online eco-boutique that I founded in 2006 . It was inspired by a love for high quality, well-made textiles. Beklina offers a well edited selection of the best in eco-fashion for women. Lines include: Manimal, Mociun, Stewart+Brown, Loudermilk, EDUN, Prairie Underground, and ORGANIC. It’s often regarded as the most fashionable and forward site for green glamour on the web. I continue to oversee Beklina and all the buying.

Lina Rennell, is my line and baby. It’s art-driven fashion, hand printed textiles and objects. The collection just launched and will be in stores at the beginning of the year. The aesthetic is Native Modern, a harmonious mix of raw, feminine & earthy, with simple, functional & evolved thought. It’s a personal project, a voice, and a real joy in my life. Big Sur Meets Helsinki  is the title of my first collection. It’s all about the relationship between mother nature and her daughter. It’s inspired by pumas, driftwood, weather worn treasures and utopian modern thought. The line is based and ethically produced in Northern California.

Postcard, 1/0 Dense Black soy-based ink, New Leaf Imagination 100# Cover Paper Stock

PB: What kinds of recurring themes and inspiration inform your design aesthetic? What is your design background?

AR: My artistic background is all over the place due to my rebellious nature. I have a BA in Liberal Arts from Washington State University, though I spent my college years studying abroad and did a Semester At Sea where we went around the world. I’m pretty much self taught as I freak out in a classroom, though I adore learning. 

I find inspiration in everything; when I don’t see or feel it, I just keep moving it physically or in my imagination, adding and subtracting, playing human until I can anchor onto something that moves me, stirs emotion and feeling. Recurring themes would be nature, punk or rebellion, timeless and classic markings & lots of color, definitely bohemian. These days it’s all about animals, objects, and crustaceans. I draw everything morning, 7 days a week, with chai and music, and if I don’t, I can be very cranky. Right now I’m working on a collection I call “shaggy objects”.  They’re single objects, abstract and inspired by typical parts of animals, like hair, fur, joints and spotted skin.

My favorite designers right now are Rachel Comey, Mociun, Henrik Vibskov, IvanaHelsinki and Tsumori Chisato. I think we forget how much fashion can shape culture and thought, and how it’s important to always push and love ourselves and be honest. Also, enjoy that part of our appearances in which we be can be creator. Fashion is and isn’t trivial.

PB: Please talk about your commitment to the environment. As a producer, how do you offset and balance your consumptive use with sustainable living efforts? 

AR: My commitment to the environment is more reflex than anything else. Meaning I don’t  try to do the right thing, it’s just obvious. To not have sprayed goods, to be aware and honest about my lifestyle and be kind to what I love. I’ve always lived close to nature. I grew up in on a little hill with lots of woods and wild animals, that was my family.

As a producer, which I think is a part of human nature, I struggle with balance. I know that so much needs to change in production. It’s not just about having organic cotton, it’s about the process involved. Making greener choices when possible, in all activities from shipping, to communication, to production. I’m very big on US made! I’d rather have non organic local, than organic from China. It goes back to sustainability, long term systems, and not just green or not green (black or white). I’m not a very spiritual person but if I had a religion I think it would be nature, whatever that means…

PB: The eco-friendly factor certainly brought you into the Pinball fold. What else made you choose Pinball?

I heard about Pinball Publishing via Jill Bliss. We carry her work at Beklina. Little Otsu as well. I love the work Pinball has done for us and I think they’re  a real gem. Pinball brings my ideas to life and I love that, and the quality of work is exceptional. I wish they were closer to us of course. But when it really comes down to it the shipping costs are less than the gas it would take to drive to and from our city.

PB: What’s next?

First off I want to tame all the work I’ve done to this point and keep is moving along. Then I hope to continue to define and develop my specific style and emotional language, and use it to speak via my wares. And I would love to design living spaces and short films, anything that is visually uplifting, stirs emotion, and moves us forward.