Rebecca van Bergen is the founder of Nest, a non-profit committed to strengthening artisan communities and businesses around the world by building bridges between brands and artisans.  Here, van Bergen, a mentor for the CFDA + Lexus Fashion* Initiative, shares her insights on the global artisan supply chain, and offers advice for reframing the sustainable fashion conversation.

How did you get involved in the global sustainable fashion conversation?

I got my degree in social work, so I had no background in fashion or business. It’s been a steep learning curve, but it’s interesting to be part of the fashion industry as an outsider and to bring a different lens to the work. In 11 years, I’ve seen the change in conversation, the interest in artisans and the interest in sustainability. There’s been a profound change in the way companies think about, talk about and invest in these ideas. So hopefully, we’re just on an upward trend that will just keep getting better and better.

Who and what is most valuable in leading us to change?

The responsibility doesn’t just fall on one. It’s not just consumers, it’s not just government, it’s not just a singular brand or non-profit. These things really need to be tackled much more holistically. Even in just the last one to three years, there’s been a strong movement within the industry to collaborate more. You see brands that consider themselves competitors coming together to work on sustainability issues.

What role does scalability play in working with artisans?

I think it goes back to seeing artisans as this massive global workforce. It’s not really about scaling one particular weaving community, but it’s about networking and building a strong community of those artisans so that they’re stronger together. I think that there’s room for smaller cooperatives that shouldn’t be pushed to scale bigger than they can, however I think that there’s enormous untapped capacity in most artisan communities…I think balancing scale, with reality and appreciation is important within this sector.

What do you think is missing from the sustainable fashion conversation?

I think there’s still a very strong bend toward environmental and not human when it comes to sustainability. We have to think about the people in our supply chains, and those are harder questions to ask sometimes; certainly messier and potentially more embarrassing for companies to talk about.

One wish for fashion’s future:

There are so many women around the world where working from home is the only option. We have to have a way in the industry to support those workers and to supply transparency. I hope that companies can see the limitations of no home-worker policies and really invest in innovative supply chains that work better for women.

Words of wisdom for designers who want to implement more artisan or socially conscious work in their companies?

I think it’s really easy to get overwhelmed, but I think even doing small things is really important. If every single small designer did a capsule collection once a year with an artisan, that would have enormous power for artisans globally.

See more of the CFDA + Lexus Fashion* Initiative sustainability story by following #ReDesignFashion.