Anchor & Crew (139)

About Anchor & Crew

Handcrafted In Great Britain, 100% Recycled & Award-Winning

Combining British craft manufacturing with a discerning modern-minimalist style, ANCHOR & CREW is multi-award winning ever since 2014 and believes in having a highly ethical and traceable supply chain.

With fans in over 85 countries, ANCHOR & CREW takes ownership of an exploratory lifestyle and enjoys the Happy-Good Life, creating unisex jewellery, accessories and lifestyle goods. Timelessly British by design and manufacture, ANCHOR & CREW is particularly known for our anchor, rope and leather bracelets, amongst others.

Craftsmanship + Materiality + Transparency + Sustainability

As well as exclusively using 100% recycled precious metals, ANCHOR & CREW is also not a jewellery brand that processes silver or gold coating of a base metal such as stainless steel or copper to create products with perceived added value. We're open to publish that there are many well-known jewellery and trusted fashion brands that do this, yet list their jewellery items online with comparative prices and ambiguous material descriptions only for their customers to realise their product degrading in months to come. For us, honesty to materials is key, and only solid precious metals provide lasting durability, quality as well as value. Together, craftsmanship, transparency and sustainability efforts epitomise ANCHOR & CREW.

Ethics

People Really Do Care About The Environment.

As an authentic brand that believes in the glory of industry, the excellence of craftsmanship, the innovation in manufacturing and the investment in skill, we are proudly from the East Midlands, handcrafted in Great Britain. Alongside such values is our commitment to social responsibility, ethics and sustainability.

At ANCHOR & CREW we believe that people do care about the environment and social welfare. Still, the reality is that many are regularly poorly informed when it comes to consumer and purchasing decisions. Hoping to empower you to make the right choice with the right information, we wanted to illustrate all the 'do-goods' that ANCHOR & CREW are implementing along the entire supply chain.

Too often is the case that large companies who have a genuine opportunity to make a significant difference in the world simply improve their internal operations without looking at the full supply chain picture. Proudly building an increasingly sustainable supply chain that is ever-improving at each of its stages, we are happy to share with you our transparent traceability; use the map above and details below to explore the origins of our materials.

Though various of the following ethics and sustainability efforts are beyond our own building's brick walls by suppliers several stages down the supply chain, it is our shared buying power (and our wider educating) that is enacting change. ANCHOR & CREW is driven by giving our fans and customers quality goods (particularly those organic, sustainable and free-trade), and these demands are only achieved by everyone playing their part and applying pressure. If only every brand understood their full picture...

Precious Metals & The Circular Economy

Working closely with Birmingham's Jewellery Quarter, the world-renowned area is historically associated with the international trading of precious metal bullion, diamonds and other materials. Trading all our .925 sterling silver, Swarovski® Zirconia and many other resources from this centre of excellence, the highest quality, once more, matters. Despite various media exploring the questionable ethics and conflicts of certain mining /refining companies, we only work with those who actively take the responsibility seriously; various supplier commitments include Fairtrade Gold, conflict-free minerals, having a well-informed supply chain, and being members of the RJC (Responsible Jewellery Council). With suppliers achieving certifications such as CFSI (Conflict-Free Sourcing Initiative) and LBMA Responsible Gold Guidance, the illegal financing of terrorist activities, military conflicts and human rights violations are all countered. With policies above and beyond industrial standards, all suppliers must never participate in money laundering, corruption, child labour or human trafficking, amongst others.

ANCHOR & CREW encourages the concept of a Circular Economy, going beyond the common consumer 'take, make and dispose' extractive industrial model. With a dedication towards the recycling of precious metal and unused materials, ANCHOR & CREW exclusively uses recycled .925 sterling silver and 9k gold (86% and 99.8% less emissive than mined precious metal equivalents respectively (source: Medium)) for all our precious metals. Any further scrappage from manufacturing is re-recycled at our licensed precious metal recycling centre to be re-inputted into our full-circle regenerative supply chain.

In an age when consumer rights are at the forefront of retail, hallmarking is in fact one of the oldest forms of consumer protection laws ever. As per the 1973 The Hallmarking Act, every product that includes precious metals such as gold, silver, platinum or palladium and is sold or manufactured in the UK must be tested and hallmarked by an independent third-party Assay Office to guarantee its authenticity. With the UK one of the very few countries in the world to have statutory hallmarking, quality is of utmost importance to ANCHOR & CREW. As such, ANCHOR & CREW is proudly not a jewellery brand that processes silver or gold coating of a base metal such as stainless steel or copper to create products with perceived added value. We're open to publishing that there are many well-known jewellery and trusted fashion brands that do this, yet list their jewellery items online with comparative prices and ambiguous material descriptions only for their customers to realise their product degrading in months to come. For us, honesty with materials is key, and only solid precious metals provide lasting durability, quality as well as value. Together, craftsmanship, transparency and sustainability efforts epitomise ANCHOR & CREW.

Woodland Supply Chain

Sourcing paper from one of the few remaining paper mills in the UK, the highest of sustainability matters. Sourcing their pulpwood from Sweden, all pulp is sustainably forested and then manufactured using either an Elemental Chlorine Free (ECF) or a Totally Chlorine Free (TCF) bleaching process. With International Standards ISO 9000 and ISO 14001 attained, all suppliers are committed to the FSC® Forest Stewardship Council® and PEFC (Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification). An integral member of The Woodland Trust, our Cumbria mill actively plants new woodland to capture carbon and help 'Global Cooling', as well as providing waste to local agricultural industries. Boasting the first industrial-scale recycling facility for the recycling of paper coffee cups (saving millions from being unnecessarily thrown away), another investment includes hydroelectricity power. Sweden's forest assets have doubled in the last 100 years due to these sustainability attempts, and others similar.

With leather sourced from the Igualada Leather Cluster (and Igualada Guild of Tanners) in Spain, again, the highest quality matters. Via considerable investment towards the biological treatment of wastewater and the minimisation and reuse of waste, the Cluster has reduced 50% water consumption per unit produced and a 40% to 50% reduction in pollution load in the last 20 years.

Textiles Supply Chain

Sourcing certified, hand-picked organic cotton from India, the safest and fairest of farmer conditions matter. Making synthetic fertiliser is carbon intensive, requiring 1tn of oil and 100tn of water to make 1tn of nitrogen fertiliser (and 7tn of Co2 emissions). In contrast, organic cotton is made from GMO-free plants that are grown without the use of any synthetic agricultural chemicals whatsoever; the usage of natural production methods increases land biodiversity as well as health improvements and a more stable income for farmers. A supply chain powered almost entirely by wind power, efforts also include using waste seeds to make cotton oil and feed cattle. With an ethical commitment to Fairtrade FLO-Cert, GOTS Global Organic Textile Standards, WRAP Compliance and Social Accountability International SA8000, employees are paid more than the national minimum wage and work in good conditions.

Closer to home in the UK, an ethical commitment is made towards a fairly paid apprenticeship scheme whereby young previously unemployed Islanders (of Isle of Wight) are given local employment, while low-waste printing technology is used to reduce CO2 emissions. 'Ethical Fashion' matters.

Whilst the ANCHOR & CREW brand is known most for our jewellery and accessories, concerning our belief in the glory of industry, the excellence of craftsmanship, the innovation in manufacturing and the investment in skill, every project that we launch will always be conceived with the aforementioned principles.