GCNYC's Fair Fashion Center Driving a New Conversation on Sustainability at Recent Textile Expos

NEW YORK, NY (July 24, 2019) - As the fashion industry’s world renowned trade shows begin to include sustainability as a recurring staple in their programming, the GCNYC Fair Fashion Center (FFC) is leading the conversation.  The FFC recently presented the opportunities to scale sustainability across the disciplines of the apparel and accessories industry at Première Vision and Texworld USA.

At Première Vision’s Smart Talks, GCNYC Vice President and FFC Founder, Cara Smyth spoke to company values, operational efficiencies, and investor incentives, as the fashion industry begins to identify and prove the business case for sustainability. 

“Industry leaders are being called upon to act as corporate statesmen, but businesses often lack the internal expertise required to navigate the myriad of environmental, social and governance (ESG) subjects,” said GCNYC Vice President and FFC Founder, Cara Smyth.  “I was delighted to share examples of the FFC’s work translating issues and incubating scalable business solutions to address fashion’s most systemic environmental and social challenges.”

Curated by Guisy Bettoni, PV Smart creation consultant, guests heard from other industry experts including Devon Leahy, Vice President of Sustainability at Ralph Lauren, and François Souchet of The Ellen MacArthur Foundation.  Since its launch in 2000, Première Vision New York has gathered the leather, accessories, design, manufacturing and fabric industries to showcase innovations and designs with over 250 exhibitors.

GCNYC’s Director of Strategy and Partnerships, Maggie Kervick, moderated a panel at Texworld USA’s Fashionsustain, entitled “Transparency and Traceability: Challenges Facing Major Brands.” Joining Kervick on the panel were Sourcemap’s Juliette Barre, Athleta’s Leslie Ferrick, PVH Corp.’s Louise Claughton, and UN Consultant Karen Newman. Together they discussed the various challenges and successes of supply chain management, as well as the innovations and technology that can help brands overcome those obstacles.

Jennifer Bacon, Show Director, Fashion & Apparel said, “As trailblazers within the textile industry, we try to spotlight what’s trending; whether that is covering certain topics or product advancements with vendors and mills. It’s important to address what’s happening in the industry to stay relevant. This year, sustainability was an obvious choice for our spotlight. Because being sustainable has reached a point that it’s too important to ignore, our show now explores the importance of speed to market, as well having the ability to supply eco-friendly sourcing options in order to retain and obtain buyers.”

New to this year’s programming at Texworld USA, Fashionsustain day-long programming educated attendees on sustainable practices with other speakers including, Liz Hershfield  from Walmart eCommerce, Tricia Carey of Lenzing, Scott Echols of ZDHC, amongst others.

Propelling the learning loop on sustainability and education, GCNYC is hosting a “Principles of Fair Fashion” workshop event on Wednesday, July 31st, taught by Maggie Kervick and Frank Zambrelli. For more information or to RSVP, visit https://www.eventbrite.com/e/principles-of-fair-fashion-tickets-62731614949