Biome Lifestyle Blog: Eco Design, Ethical Fashion and Green News

I was delighted to see images earlier this week of the lovely Joanna Lumley posing in an amazing gold & diamond encrusted Shere Khan necklace, with the aim of raising over £300,000 for the fantastic Born Free Foundation.

Designed by award-winning jeweller Catherine Best to depict the tiger in Rudyard Kipling’s ‘Jungle Book’, the jewellery holds 182 precious stones set in nearly a kilo of 18ct gold and has been independently valued at more than £500,000.

The Sher Khan Necklace will be auctioned worldwide from yesterday May 31 until June 17, when a gala evening will be held at the Savoy Hotel in London to mark the 80th birthday of actress Virginia McKenna, who founded the Born Free Foundation.

The Born Free Foundation is an amazing international wildlife charity working throughout the world to stop individual wild animal suffering and protect threatened species in the wild. Some of you may remember the film Born Free, which stared the founder of the charity Virginia McKenna. I watched this film so many times when I was younger and recently bought the DVD so I can watch it again!

Well done Joanna, it’s great to see you are supporting fantastic causes, again!

21st Century Leaders is a unique charity artwork project. The charity gather artworks from leaders in all fields; royalty, film, music, Nobel Peace Prize laureates, sports, literature etc. The range of celebrities who have offered artwork range include Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Gwen Stefani, Annie Lennox, David Bowie, The Foo Fighters, Christine Slater, Nicole Kidman, Amy Winehouse, Sir Bob Geldof and many many more…

The celebrity artworks are used to create Whatever It Takes products: ‘merchandise with a meaning’. From wristbands to clothing, from tableware to cosmetics and footwear, each product is ethically produced and sold to raise funds for charitable causes chosen by each contributing leader. So far almost £540,000 has been raised, but the aim is to at least triple this figure in the nex couple of years. The money raised will help to fund charitable projects in developing countries, contribute to the protection of the environment and other charitable causes. A few examples of the products available are pictured below

Biome Lifestyle thinks it is a fantastic cause which is cleverly using the ‘power if celebrities’ to raise money and awareness for many fantastic projects. To read more, go to www.whateverittakes.org.