Chloé CEO Riccardo Bellini on how fashion can make sustainability sexy

This article is part of our Vogue Business Membership package. To enjoy unlimited access to Member-only reporting and insights, our NFT Tracker and TikTok Trend Tracker, weekly Technology and Sustainability Edits and exclusive event invitations, sign up for Membership here. Fashion is at its best when it models and reflects societal values, says Chloé CEO Riccardo Bellini, and it has a responsibility to elevate sustainability as one of those core values. At last Thursday’s Vogue Business and Google Summit, Bellini discussed how fashion can set the tone for sustainability as a necessity during his keynote conversation. “That’s what fashion can do in sustainability — it can drive the cultural relevance of the subject,” he said. “This is always the beauty and excitement of fashion. We’re talking about sustainability — it's always been in the forefront of the narrative of many fashion companies in many ways. Once embraced by fashion companies, you create a lot of cultural value around those messages.” The Richemont-owned brand has invested in more sustainability initiatives since Gabriela Hearst was appointed creative director in late 2020. It achieved B Corp certification last year, released a tool for measuring social impacts in February and, most recently, unveiled a project with its latest collection aimed at sourcing sustainable raw materials and progressing towards a circular business model. In his keynote, Bellini drew on that experience to talk about the brand’s journey towards sustainability and what others might be able to learn from it. For one, sustainability is about collaboration — internally, among teams, as well as industry-wide, between brands — rather than competition. “If you wanted a message for the industry, it’s really collaboration, collaboration, collaboration. There are issues that can go significantly beyond the specific areas of influence of the company that need to be tackled by the industry itself,” he said. “The fashion industry, we are the master of anticipating desire, and creating desire that did not exist. Desire is at the heart of the industry,” he said. “When you start to truly communicate and embrace sustainability, in your messaging, your narrative and [you are] walking the talk, you also have the power to create desire around that.” Sustainability is not a constraint on creativity, he pointed out. In fact, Bellini said, the opposite is true. It requires a different way of working, and in many ways may draw on different skill sets, such as the ability to work with materials you already have because you are upcycling secondhand garments or designing a collection using deadstock. The notion that working with sustainability as a priority is limiting for a designer is archaic and untrue, he said. Finally, brands do not need to — and should not — wait for consumers to demand certain aspects of sustainability before they choose to act on them. That’s where the ability of fashion to serve as a role model and leverage its cultural influence comes into play. “We do answer consumer expectations, but I think when big players embrace it, we also have the power to accelerate the change of those expectations,” he said. To receive the Vogue Business newsletter, sign up here. Comments, questions or feedback? Email us at feedback@voguebusiness.com. More from this author: With digital IDs, Chloé plots supply chain progress and a circular future What is fashion’s down payment for the climate? What the Coperni spray-on dress says about sustainability in fashion

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