Hello from Waseda University in Japan and an amazing People Tree Christmas Party! (People Tree Japan style!)

The Waseda University Cafaire, a students Fair Trade group, invited me along to their Fair Trade Fashion Show with other guests Ai Tominaga, one of Japan’s leading models and a woman who is very active in social and environmental issues – and my friend Yoshiko Ikoma, who has been editor of Vogue, Elle and Marie Claire over the last 20 years! There was a great panel discussion about how young people can support Fair Trade fashion in Japan followed by a fantastic fashion show!

I was in Japan opening a new People Tree concession in Ginza, Tokyo last week. It’s on the third floor of MOSAIC department store, so if you happen to be in Tokyo have a look round. We have two other shops; one in Omotesando, and our longest standing store of 12 years in Jiyugaoka close to our office.

To wake in a mountain house in the Japan Alps is a reminder as to why the sanity of cool air, no sound of cars, and a view of steep forested slopes disappearing into the mists rests the body and soul. For the past week in my flat in Tokyo I haven’t slept – or that’s how it feels.

People Tree customers, supporters and staff gathered at , Blue Moon , an eco-beach house in Hayama where bikinis and promoting environmental issues go hand in hand.

Christel signs our wall at People Tree’s shop in Omotesando Tokyo. You can buy the UK version of By Hand from the People Tree website here.

Well, if I’m going to fly back and forth it had better be a busy week. I worked it out to off set my CO2 flying London to Tokyo and back I have to sell over1000 organic cotton t-shirts! (Growing organically sequesters 1.5 CO2 emission per acre, that’s 800 t-shirts per acre, at 2.5 tons of CO2 for a London – Tokyo return flight) So that’s why I have no choice but to work hard whenever I go overseas.

It’s an unusually warm evening for mid-October and even though everyone in Tokyo is layered and booted, I’m bare armed in my Bora Aksu organic cotton drape top when I arrive at Mihara Yasuhiro’s office / studio / exhibition (oh, how I wish People Tree had such a lovely, big space in Tokyo!)

Murakami Ryu is one of my favourite writers so what a pleasure to be able to meet him when I appeared on Cambria Kyuden which aired on Tokyo TV this week. The co-presenter is so gorgeous she makes me feel like a “blob”!

We opened a shop 10 years ago because I was fed up and embarrassed opening the front door to customers in my pjs and scrambling around for change – people wanted to buy stuff at my home and office – so we decided to open a shop.