Activist Modeling. Disrupting the Runway - with Eric Vinsonneau
Fashion shows were invented almost two centuries ago with the same purpose they have today - sell the look, move the product; little has changed. Eric Vinsonneau is using his role as a model to disrupt that, and to flip the narrative that sustainability is the limiting factor, when overconsumption is the one that actually limits us.
Culture & Society
Eric Vinsonneau, model, founder of RE/CLAIMED, and Fashion Revolution Ambassador, only walks for designers who carry a real sense of social accountability - conscious about what brand he lends his image to, looking for more than just aesthetics.
That standard comes from his own past advising corporate boards on sustainability, watching decisions get made by people fully disconnected from any real impact. He sees the same disconnection in the runway itself - a format that has looked essentially the same for over a century: sell the look, move the product, no substance, no why.
With RE/CLAIMED, the concept show he is building with two friends and partners, he's working to close that gap - live upcycling, installations, gamification elements that go beyond aesthetics and include performances to showcase the fashion industry's problems and give the audience agency to leave the room and start changing.
We talk about what Berlin and Kantamanto have in common, what a visit to an elderly center can teach about upcycling, and why Eric wants to upcycle men's suits.
Photo Credit: cheriebirkner
TOPICS DISCUSSED
02:53 — Modeling with a conscience: how the industry is slowly shifting, and what still holds it back
08:26 — Life inside corporate sustainability
11:52 — Reinventing the fashion show
20:10 — Berlin and Ghana: resilience, community, and a shared upcycling identity across two very different worlds
23:14 — Necessity, comfort, and what an elderly center in France taught Eric about upcycling
26:32 — The sustainability narrative fashion got wrong
28:10 — Inside RE/CLAIMED: live upcycling, a textile waste mountain, and measuring whether any of it actually changes behavior
34:40 — Closing question: what Eric would like to upcycle
RELATED LINKS
tHERAPY Antagonia Collection
Listen also on Spotify and Apple Podcasts
COM/VERGE: community and convergence — on the road to the first global fashion upcyclers summit.