Redress To Impress: Meet Sustainable Fashion Pioneer Christina Dean

Sustainability pioneer Christina Dean talks circular fashion with Prestige.

Redress is a world-leading sustainable fashion design competition. The power of the Redress Design Award is that it spotlights designers’ techniques that can make fashion more sustainable, and our project is one way that we’re changing the design approach globally.

The moment I decided to start Redress was over a glass of chardonnay. I was working as a journalist and writing about environmental issues in the textile industry. I was shocked by the industry’s rampant negative environmental impacts, so I started Redress to create the advocacy vehicle we need.

The 2024 competition cycle has been a key highlight in our journey. With our prize partner and exclusive fashion sponsor Tommy Hilfiger at the helm, our first-prize winner will be taken into their team to work on a sustainable fashion project for retail.

The power of partnership is my most energising fuel – I’m so crazily in love with the fashion industry, and of how much good it could do for the world if it had ethical, sustainable and circular supply chains.

My greatest strength is being outward-facing with our various and wide range of stakeholders, many of whom I’ve become friends with after all these years. However, my colleagues will likely complain that I’m a bit of a perfectionist; so whenever I can, I do drill down into the detail, down to the full stops.

The older I get, the more chilled and accepting I get, despite my workload, responsibilities and commitments having only increased. My mum always tells me there are no prizes for burning out.

My vision is that fashion must become a circular economy, i.e, a system where materials never become waste and nature is regenerated – and where responsibility is taken for the product’s entire lifecycle and its impact on the planet.