H&M welcomes 2022 with Innovation Circular Design Story, their newest foray into sustainable design. For all the fraidy cats out there, who think putting sustainability front and center in selling exciting fashion is high risk and sales depressing, could we get some perspective, please?

H&M — one of the the world biggest retailers — a company who cannot afford to screw up in the month of December. In a month where most retailers try to minimize risk and going with what they know, H&M has chosen to make sustainability its big December story. And it’s a beauty.

AOC has learned to check H&M weekly and sometimes daily for sustainability news. Just in case you’re like the anti-vaxers on the topic of our environment, H&M has launched another new endeavor around educating people about sustainability, climate change and the world of fashion.

The joint effort between the Stockholm-based Fotografiska and the H&M Foundaiton will create The Changing Room, which is an online exhibition by the visual artist, Tobias Gremmler. The presentation presents seven solutions that fashion can research further and adapt to that will positively impact our planet.

Diana Amini, Global Manager at H&M Foundation, says, ‘we want to create awareness of the powerful impact sustainable fashion innovation can achieve if given the opportunity to scale. In the innovation space, you can experience a t-shirt made of trapped carbon dioxide from the air, shoes crafted from wine-making leftovers and lab-grown cotton. These solutions exist and are giving back instead of taking from the planet, which is one of the keys to turning the fashion industry planet positive’.

Returning to Innovation Circular Design Story in select H&M stores and online now.

Not only does H&M hit it out of the ballpark with Innovation Circular Design Story, but they went out and hired two of the hottest names among fashion creatives to make it happen. H&M empowered groundbreaking photographer Rafael Pavarotti and Creative Advisor, stylist, Dazed EIC Ib Kamara to collaborate with the in-house design team to create the collection named “Just before the party starts.” Both Kamara and Pavarotti were given creative agency to go where their superb instincts took them.

Innovation Circular Design Story is great news — a present to the fashion industry, H&M customers and Mother Earth, too — and we are not done yet. To celebrate this groundbreaking holiday party collection, H&M has teamed up with Normani, Gigi Hadid and Kaia Gerber, dropping a pile of euros for the trio to embrace and communicate to their zillion followers the excitement and anticipation of H&M December’s party-prep and dressing up.

The collection has been designed using a design tool called the Circulator which allows the H&M design team to consider all stages of the garment creation process, from expected lifetime to materials and design strategies. The Circulator is being developed by H&M Group in order to support the company in its efforts to become more circular, and to reach their goal of becoming climate positive by 2040.

The aim is that all H&M products will be designed using the tool by 2025. Not 2030, not 2040, not 2050. 2025 is in our faces — like NOW.

This is why AOC refuses to criticize H&M in pointless jabs at their size and contribution to polluting our earth. H&M acknowledges that reality with every breath the company inhales.

If they can figure out these challenging sustainability issues, there is no excuse for all the other naysayers, who can’t be bothered to work diligently to save our planet. If H&M pulls off the many sustainability efforts they are leading, they deserve their own special Nobel Prize.

What are the sustainability-related elements driving “Just before the party starts?” In their own words, H&M explains:

The H&M design team has done extensive work to ensure that every garment has been designed with circularity in mind. One of the key concepts that can move the industry forward is to consider already when starting the design process what will happen at the end of the life cycle. Another is taking responsibility for own textile waste and producing mono fiber garments to further enable recyclability.

As we get ready to dance the night away again, new fabrics and innovations take center stage. Some of which include: REPREVE® Our Oceans®, fibers sourced from bottles collected from shorelines and coastal areas. Resortecs®, a dissolvable sewing thread for attaching sequins and beads. It allows garments to easily be taken apart and recycled at the end of their life. Vegea™, an innovative vegan material partly made from grape skins, stalks and seeds discarded during wine making and turned into a beautiful alternative to leather. And Cycora® by Ambercycle, a fabric that makes use of old garments and end-of-life textile waste.

AOC says bravo, bravo, bravo. You keep us going H&M, because there is NO DOUBT that you are walking your talk. When you come out of a massive retail organization as I do with Victoria’s Secret, I understand the formidable challenges in front of you to make all this happen.

On this front, you are the north star — the aurora borealis, H&M. For goddesses sake, do not let us down, because I will make a video of myself weeping. Not cursing but weeping. Trust me, you don’t want to hear Anne wailing. Happy New Year, H&M. We are counting on you to help us all before earth-friendly consumers ~ AE