Interview Fashion United Marjolein Stormezand April 2019
Sustainability expert Franklin von Winckelmann:
“I want to be the connecting bridge between a company and supplier”
The textile & clothing covenant is the starting point to emphasize this, but denitely not leading.
FashionUnited speaks to Franklin von Winckelmann by telephone about the new step in his sustainable career.
His plan is therefore to work as a ‘hands-on-builder’. According to the designer, this means building a intercultural bridge between companies and suppliers.
He went through all stages of a sustainable production chain from the cultivation of an organic cotton plant in South America to the final consumer product.
“With this project in Paraguay I achieved the highest level of sustainability: the Global Organic Textile Standard (GOTS). Seventy percent of how I work today from Indonesia is sustainable. For VonWinckelmann, as a small company it was easier to make the switch to sustainability. The bigger challenge lies with SMEs who are just not small enough to be able to switch quickly and not big enough to be able to use huge of budgets,” says the designer.
“Because if the new sustainable direction does not pay off, it wouldn’t make sense to be sustainable.”
Franklin von Winckelmann offers his expertise to members of Modint (branch association), government and non government organizations, recruitment agencies and as an independent CSR expert through his network and Clean and Unique (an organization that helps fashion companies and designers to implement sustainable solutions).