page_title: Summer Rayne Oakes
section_title: Writer
hierarchical_section_title: Summer Rayne Oakes / Career / Writer
caption_attribution_description: English: American environmentalist, model, and author Summer Rayne Oakes teaching gardening at a community garden in New York City, in 2018, as part of her Houseplant Masterclass. The Houseplant Masterclass is an online audio-visual course and experience to help you demystify plant care and learn how to have a relationship with your plants. More information here: kck.st/2G7dnbj
context_page_description: Summer Rayne Oakes is an American fashion model, environmental activist, author, and entrepreneur, known as the world's first "eco-model". Oakes grew up in rural Pennsylvania, where her concern for the environment began early. She studied ecology in college, where she noticed that scientific papers on the environment received much less attention than popular media. She became a model in New York City, and insisted on only modeling clothing made from organic or recycled materials. These principles cost her work, but gained her notice and the title of world's first "eco-model".
  Besides modeling, Oakes has worked as a writer and editor for fashion magazine Lucire, as a television reporter for environmental network Planet Green, and has written three books: Style, Naturally, a shopping guide to eco-friendly fashion and beauty products; SugarDetoxMe, a book of recipes to remove free sugars; and How to Make a Plant Love You on raising plants in an urban homestead. She also co-founded an award winning web site, Le Souk, formerly Source4Style, which connects environmentally conscious fashion designers to ecologically friendly fabric producers.
context_section_description: Oakes was interviewed in New Zealand fashion magazine Lucire in April 2005. She went on to write for the magazine, starting with "Behind the Label", a series of articles on ethical and sustainable fashion designers. Oakes became Lucire's acting editor for two issues in 2006, then US editor in 2007, and editor-at-large since then, contributing stories on body image, fair trade, and trends in sustainable design. She hosted the 2007 season of Singapore-based environmental television program Eco 4 the World.
  In 2008, Oakes became an environmental reporter on Planet Green, an environmental-focused network from Discovery Communications. She served as a correspondent for the program G Word, during which she reported from a methane-recapture farm, climbed windmills, and swam in the Pacific Trash Vortex. She had her own environmentally friendly fashion and beauty advice column "Ask Summer Rayne" on the Planet Green web site. Discovery relaunched Planet Green with a different focus in 2012.
  Oakes launched her first book, Style, Naturally, in early 2009. It is a shopping guide to eco-friendly fashion and beauty products.
  SugarDetoxMe began as a 2014 blog and website to document Oakes's 30-day removal of free sugars from her diet, then grew to a program to help others do the same. In 2017, it was joined by a book of recipes of the same name, partly based on Dr. Mark Hyman's book The Blood Sugar Solution; Hyman also endorses Oakes's program.
  Oakes's third book, How to Make a Plant Love You: Cultivating Your Personal Green Space, scheduled for July 2019, grew out of her experiences with the hundreds of plants she cultivated in her apartment and is accompanied by a website "Homestead Brooklyn", a YouTube series "Plant One On Me", and an online course "Houseplant Masterclass".
caption: Oakes teaching at a New York City community garden, in 2018
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