For the past 16 years — pandemic notwithstanding — sustainability experts have gathered in Copenhagen each June for the Global Fashion Summit (GFS), a two-day symposium organised by the Global Fashion Agenda (GFA), spanning panel discussions, closed-door roundtables, an innovation expo and sprawling side events. While the official programme reflects shifting priorities at a higher level, it’s the mood among attendees that offers the most useful pulse check of the broader state of sustainable fashion.
Having cycled through rebellion, voluntary action, technological optimism and — more recently — realism (pinning their hopes on regulation), the audience seems to have landed somewhere between dejected and defiant. It’s understandable, given the broader climate: the environmental challenges GFS was founded to fix are bounding past irreversible tipping points, and the past year has proven that regulators are an unreliable saviour. In fact, their efforts are dwindling, as global politics swing to the right and geopolitical instability takes hold. At the summit, big brands kept a lower profile, perhaps keen to avoid the wrath of greenwashing watchdogs and the anti-ESG Trump administration.
