Amid the passing of fashion giant Valentino Garavani, we take a look at the maison’s sustainability efforts through the years.
Valentino’s origins lie in the meeting of Garavani and his life partner and business manager Giancarlo Giammetti, who together built the maison into a global luxury brand from its Via Condotti atelier. Under Garavani’s guidance, it became known for the meticulous craftsmanship of couture gowns worn by Hollywood stars and royalty alike, alongside a broader ready-to-wear and accessories business that now includes sneakers, beauty, and lifestyle categories.
“As a creator, beauty is the most important,” Garavani said in a 2011 interview. “Since I was a child I loved the way a dress looks, I admired a great face, a lovely body. I enjoy the beauty in a woman, in a man, in a child, in a painting. Beautiful things are important and make life important. Since I was a kid I’ve been encouraging myself to appreciate beauty.”
With renewed global spotlight following Garavani’s death, Valentino’s sustainability narrative deserves close attention — not as an addendum to its creative prestige but as a structural evolution of the brand’s identity in the twenty-first century.
‘Let The Beauty Prosper’: Valentino’s strategic framework
Valentino’s overarching sustainability strategy goes by the motto Let the Beauty Prosper, an ethos the house has defined as integral to its future trajectory. In its first Sustainability Report, released in 2023, Valentino positioned its efforts within a framework developed to align with Global Reporting Initiative standards, describing the initiative as central to its responsible and ethical approach to people and planet.
In introducing the report, its creative director, Pierpaolo Piccioli, and CEO Jacopo Venturini wrote, “As a Maison de Couture, it is important for us to keep developing sustainably while building resiliency and maintaining repeatable, ethical, and responsible growth. At Valentino, we understand the urgency of taking action on sustainability, and we are committed to promoting a culture that embraces our environment and its community.”
Let the Beauty Prosper embeds sustainability as a structural imperative rather than a seasonal initiative. The report articulated three core pillars — Product, People, and Planet — each with measurable objectives, including traceability goals by 2030 and significant renewable energy integration targets.
Valentino’s subsequent 2023 Sustainability Report continued this narrative, reporting meaningful progress across these pillars. Over 70 percent of key raw materials such as leather and fabrics were traceable in 2023, and approximately 90 percent of energy for headquarters and boutiques in Italy came from renewable sources. Seven new free-standing stores worldwide achieved Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification that year, and the Group’s carbon footprint was measured and reduced compared to 2022. The number of LEED-certified Valentino stores now stands at 12.
Open For A Change: sneakers with a sustainable twist
One of the brand’s earliest widely publicized sustainability gestures came in the footwear category with Open for a Change, a project that re-engineered two of Valentino’s iconic sneakers — the Open and Rockstud Untitled — with environmentally oriented materials.
Valentino described the redesign candidly:
“Created from the Maison’s desire to explore innovative materials and techniques for the future, the latest footwear versions of the Open and Rockstud Untitled for the first time partially involve recycled and bio-based materials while continuing to reflect the aesthetic and trademark motifs of the Maison, representing a conscious, firm step on the path to a sustainable ethos.”
The Open for a Change sneakers incorporated bio-based alternatives to leather, recycled polyester for laces, and recycled nylon studs, alongside packaging produced from entirely recycled cotton and paper sourced from sustainably managed forests. While not fully vegan, the initiative signaled a new chapter in how Valentino integrated sustainability into its product design language — maintaining its signature aesthetic while engaging with responsible materials and circularity practices.
Though launched more than four years ago, the Open for a Change project stands as an early public expression of Valentino’s willingness to reimagine heritage products through a sustainability lens — marrying craftsmanship with material innovation.
Valentino Beauty: acts of love in footprint and packaging
Valentino’s sustainability narrative extends beyond fashion into beauty, where its beauty division has articulated a commitment to reducing environmental impact across production, packaging, and retail operations. According to Valentino Beauty’s sustainability statements, core ranges of lipsticks and fragrances are produced in facilities powered by renewable energy, with efforts to reuse, recycle, or recover waste.
Refillable products are a centerpiece of the beauty division’s sustainability story, with 75 percent of products sold either refillable or actual refills. This strategy seeks to engage customers directly in waste reduction choices, underscoring how product design can incorporate sustainability without sacrificing desirability.
Valentino Beauty also emphasized responsible gift packaging, opting for 100 percent cardboard boxes that are recyclable and lighter for transportation, alongside Forest Stewardship Council certified paper — a reflection of its material-centric approach to environmental stewardship.
The traceable future
Across fashion and beauty, Valentino’s 2023 report highlighted initiatives around raw material traceability, internal inclusivity and equity programs, and community engagement. The reopening of a comprehensive couture training program and the formation of an internal inclusive and equity committee underscore how Let the Beauty Prosper encompasses not only environmental targets but social sustainability as well.
On the Planet axis, sustainability actions included a reduction in carbon footprint and the reuse of set-up materials from fashion shows in partnership with local associations. Initiatives to measure and decrease emissions reflect a more data-driven phase of sustainability, signaling that the house’s commitments are increasingly tethered to measurable outcomes.
As Valentino moves forward under the creative leadership of Alessandro Michele — who in September 2024 succeeded Pierpaolo Piccioli — the sustainability evolution will likely continue to intersect with the maison’s creative direction, shaping how a storied fashion legacy adapts to the priorities of a new decade.
Michele brought the sustainability effort Off the Grid to Gucci in 2020.
“I like to test myself on the most unlikely projects,” he said at the time. “We realized we could produce something that was 100 percent in compliance with our desire to create using only recycled, regenerated, and sustainable materials, without forsaking quality, design, or performance,” he told Vogue. “The project has become a symbol for the new era.”
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