18 Eco Friendly & Ethical Sandals

In the spirit of walking towards a greener future, we’ve been on an ethical and sustainable shoe kick lately. So it seemed like the right time to dive into eco-friendly and ethical sandals. Perfect for when sustainable flip flops are a little too function-not-fashion for you. 

Let’s step into talking about these sustainable sandals, strap-backs, and more.  We’ve divided them into vegan ethical sandals and other ethical sandals (that typically use leather but do incredible things for local communities involved in their production) for easy browsing.

About Salt and Umber Leather Sustainable Sandals

Salt and Umber is a woman-owned ethical footwear brand that believes in “eco-luxury for all”. Their Lilliana sandals are a modern take on the classic mule shoes.

With an androgynous silhouette and subtle metallic sheen, these modest mules pop just the right amount. Choose between four colors, including cognac, gold, positano, and gray.

Salt and Umber’s Ethical and Sustainability Practices

Materials: 

The Lilliana sandals are made with recycled TPU outsoles and vegetable-tanned leather uppers sourced from a Leather Working Group (LWG) Gold-rated tannery.  While this isn’t as sustainable as upcycling leather, it’s about as sustainable as virgin leather gets.  

Supply chain & labor practices: 

All Salt and Umber shoes are hand-made in small batches and without emission-causing machinery.  They are woven by craftswomen in rural India who work with Salt and Umber via a Fair Trade cooperative system.

For marketing and packaging, they use recycled materials and recently phased out shoe boxes in their last production run.  This decreases waste for us consumers and their carbon footprint is reduced by about 50%.  

Community & charitable giving: 

Co-op style weaving houses in India, like Salt and Umber provide gainful employment for women. They also receive empowerment opportunities through company-sponsored microloans and education.

 

To read more of Sustainable Jungle's article, click here.