Of all the cities to learn about sustainability, New York City could definitely be the best place. New York City provides plenty of good examples of sustainability as well as many bad ones. While in NYC, my eyes were opened to many companies that are implementing good sustainability practices into their production and the way that they do business. On our first day in New York, we visited the studio of designer Mara Hoffman. Besides learning about how Mara’s team assists in putting together her wonderful collections, we also learned about the sustainability practices that they are implementing into their clothing lines. Once Mara Hoffman became a mother, she realized how important it was to give back to fashion and give back to the environment. This is when the company began to head into their sustainability movement. They now only use organic textiles to create their beautiful garments. Along with this, they are also trying to move all of their production into the U.S., specifically New York in order to further improve their sustainability movement. They did say that this would be much more expensive but worth it considering how much harm is would be sparing the environment. Mara Hoffman was not the only brand that I noticed making huge changes. Gap also has a new store division in the city referred to as “Gap for Good”. The windows had signs that said things like “Introducing a curated collection of our sustainable favorites” and “How we make our clothing matters”. This store was decorated all green in order to create an environmentally friendly feel. The store was full of sustainable denim that was also very fashionable. H&M is also becoming very environmentally conscious and pushing their customers to do the same. At any H&M store, customers are able to exchange their old clothing for a 15% discount off of their purchase. They accept any clothing and textiles from any brand, in any condition, year-round. Learning about these companies that are making proactive decisions to better their business and environment was very refreshing in a city that is notorious for harming the environment. As I was walking around the streets in NYC, I could not help but notice the amount of liter on the ground and exhaust in the air. Not to mention the amount of energy wasted all around the city, especially in times square. Although it can be difficult to think about NYC as being sustainable, I fully believe that with strong changes to big companies, progress with be made and the environment will be thankful.