Stella McCartney has partnered with LVMH-owned Veuve Clicquot on a project to turn manually collected grape stems from the Champagne harvest into luxury accessories. McCartney, who also serves as sustainability adviser to LVMH’s Bernard Arnault, worked the grape leather into three Frayme bags and a bottle holder containing Veuve Clicquot Yellow Label.
She has also created two Elyse sandal styles, which also feature a platform wedge made from recycled cork waste collected from the Veuve Clicquot cellars in Reims, France. According to LVMH, the grape material was created in less than 18 months and helps to reduce two great sources of greenhouse gas emissions: leather and winemaking.
Asked whether there were any challenges working with the grape material, McCartney argued that it looks, feels and lasts the same as real leather. “Cork is very sustainable. It’s one of the greenest alternatives out there and is 100 percent natural, renewable and recyclable. As well as producing oxygen, harvested cork trees absorb 3 to 5 times more CO2 than non-harvested trees.” she said.
Over the past years, Veuve Clicquot has been exploring next-generation materials, creating packaging made from vegetal waste, and making all its gift boxes from hemp, a soil-regenerative and CO2-fixing plant. McCartney has also been helping to pioneer regenerative agriculture in fashion, having supported a regenerative cotton project in Turkey, in partnership with LVMH.
Vegan alternatives to leather are thought to generate less than half the carbon footprint of animal leather. By creating biobased material using waste, they are creating “sustainable solutions that are kinder to animals, and the environment.”
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