Buy with the end in mind | Giulio Bonazzi

To celebrate the 52nd International Earth Day, we met the President and CEO of Aquafil SpA Giulio Bonazzi, with whom we talked about sustainability and environmental protection in relation to the fashion luxury industry.

“We are often fascinated by the beauty of a product or its function of use, but we don’t think about what happens when we (inevitably) won’t use it anymore. By the way, what is most important to me is the health of consumers and therefore the absence of toxic products'. Giulio B.

What are the main problems you faced when you introduced the concept of regeneratable products in the company?
Lev Tolstòj said 'I hear so many people who want to change the world but none who want to change themselves!' I was the first obstacle and the second was to convince and involve the people close to me, those we call in jargon 'top executives'. Once we overcome these two levels, we start with the research and technological development, which in the case of Econyl® has been extremely hard.

44% of brands follow a sustainable strategy over time regarding the use of materials [Fashion Revolution Transparency Index 2021]. But which parameters actually measure the sustainability of a strategy?
Our industry is just at the beginning of a journey, an exciting one, and consequently there are still no established and universally accepted parameters. Today I would look at the 'carbon footprint' and LCA obviously hoping they are seriously measured.

For years, the goal of luxury brands has been to satisfy consumers with exclusive and desirable products and services, how should they evolve now that consumer orientation is increasingly shifting towards sustainability?
Never renounce to beauty! With Econyl® there are no limitations from any point of view. Then there is a distinction to make, once chosen the most sustainable materials, I think of luxury as a product of art. If you bring back a Prada garment or a Gucci bag I don’t recycle them, I instead put them in the second-hand channel; I have different thoughts for the fast fashion market.

In an interview about 'eco-design' you said that some products are not born to be recycled, what are they so? And which should be more implemented by luxury brands to cope with this issue?
Today the products that are born to be recycled are very few - the garment that taught me the most is the jacket of Napapijri 'Circular Series' that embraces the logic of the mono-material Nylon= Econyl. One of the advantages of the product that comes with this 'technology' is that it can recycle all the waste of the pre-consumer phases, and not only post-consumer.

How much do the labels/cards of a brand at the moment of purchase tell us about production and sustainability?
Today little or nothing... tomorrow we hope more. Attention then to greenwashing, which today is even under the lens of the European Commission!!

In your opinion, which brands in particular, have adopted exemplary and innovative sustainability strategies?
Stella McCartney is certainly among the firsts, but to date (fortunately) almost everyone has arrived. I hope that words will be quickly translated into action - it is difficult to draw up a ranking anyway and it would perhaps be wrong to do so. The market will determine it, it is a do it or die!

What have been the virtuous moments of sustainable fashion in the last period?
Eco-design, second hand, fashion rental, repairability of clothes before and after sale

What do you think will be your next challenge?
The union of sustainability - circularity - digitalization. That’s where we need to go if we want to change the world, and that’s our goal.

'In 2019, PRADA launches the Re-Nylon project, a collection of iconic Econyl regenerated nylon bags, in collaboration with yarn manufacturer Aquafil'.