Dear fellow community,
Before I ask anything of you, I want to begin with gratitude for those inclined to improvement and a better world.
Though it’s increasingly a race against the clock with pressing net-zero ambitions, impending textile regulations, climate-related risk disclosures, dire biodiversity loss, grave human rights abuses, mounting textile and plastic waste, and a general sense of hopelessness from consumers – my Gen Z spirit says: “It’s going to be fine!”
But the world over people, rightfully, have lingering skepticism.
Will our industries really align on and scale up the necessary solutions? What work needs to be prioritized and elevated right now, and where are the remaining gaps in education, infrastructure and financing? When will we get beyond greenwashing so that more brands are doing more of the real work to make fashion less of a harmful function? And, perhaps most urgent: what are the innovative solutions that will see change start to take shape sooner than 2025?
These questions and more fueled the thinking behind WWD, Footwear News and Beauty Inc.’s upcoming Sustainability Forum, aptly titled “Scaling Solutions: The Innovator’s Agenda.”
As such, we’ll be convening—in person for the first time in a while—the innovative brand leaders, visionary entrepreneurs, finance wizards, fearless climate justice activists and genius supply chain innovators, right here in New York City. Execs from Neiman Marcus Group, P&G, Remake, Material Innovation Initiative (Mii), Just Capital, and more are evidence that this kind of innovation and problem-solving is well underway.
Whether it’s hearing from Alison Omens, chief strategy officer at Just Capital, to contextualize how recent SEC moves may affect climate-related risk disclosures; Áslaug Magnúsdóttir, founder of Katla, cofounder of Moda Operandi, on how NFTs can give back and reduce exhaustive waste on more sustainable blockchains; Seth Levey, thredUP’s head of public policy and sustainability, on why the reseller is advocating for circularity and reuse in Washington and Albany; Diarrha N’Diaye-Mbaye, founder and CEO of Ami Colé on the clean beauty evolution; or Nicole Rawling, cofounder and CEO of Material Innovation Initiative; the woman who helped catapult meat alternatives to mainstream status…there will be tangible takeaways from the conversations that happen both on and off stage.
We welcome you to stay the course, get aligned on this roadmap for fashion and beauty’s future and be inspired to scale sustainability sooner than later. Sustainability is a topic with a soul – and plenty of things to learn – the least we can do is figure it out together.
Kaley Roshitsh
Editor, Sustainability
WWD
