Stella McCartney chose the young actress and animal lover Madelyn Cline for the 2023 summer campaign. The shooting was done at the animal sanctuary The Gentle Barn in Santa Clarita, California, inspired by the activist slogan ‘Change the History’ by Japanese artist Yoshitomo Nara, whose illustrations and punk statements feature in the collection.
This serves as an invitation to a new generation of change-makers to raise their voices for our fellow humans and the planet. “Only in the United Kingdom – reports a note from the brand – there are more than 600,000 vegans, quadrupling in the last decade (The Vegan Society). As more people rethink their eating habits, this should extend to their wardrobes. The same agricultural industrial complex that raises and kills over 92 billion land animals each year for food (Humane Society International), also feeds the hunger of the leather fashion industry, as well as polluting waterways, poisoning tannery workers and driving the destruction of vital ecosystems, including the Amazon rainforest”.
“What’s more punk than disrupting the entire food and fashion complex by removing animal products from the equation? My watchword at the moment is: ‘We are what we eat, we are what we wear’. Our choices have interconnected impacts and if we are to change history and protect Mother Earth for future generations, we need to take action – from stopping eating meat to ending needless animal deaths for fashion,” said Stella McCartney.
Originally presented at the Center Pompidou during Paris Fashion Week, the summer 2023 collection is free from leather, feathers, fur and exotic skins, with the ready-to-wear offering made from 91% responsible materials. The collection includes the world‘s first luxury garment made with regenerative cotton, sourced from Stella McCartney’s ‘Soktas’ project in Turkey. Launched in 2019, the project is now run in partnership with LVMH and is working with the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe to develop blockchain tracking technology.