Long a bastion for cheap, fast-fashion manufacturing, a new crop of designers are trying to transform the Made in Vietnam label and save the country's rich ethnic heritage in the process. In the remote hills of Cao Bang, some 300 kilometres north of the capital Hanoi, Vietnamese designer Thao Vu is gleefully dropping swaths of hand-spun cotton into a large bucket of fermented indigo leaves. The 38-year-old designer has been tapping into this growing global trend by working with some of Vietnam's 54 ethnic minority groups, each of which have their own unique textiles and traditional clothing designs.
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Fast fashion to ethical couture: Vietnam’s design evolution