Matchesfashion.com partners with sustainability consultancy Eco-Age

Matchesfashion.com has partnered with Livia Firth's sustainability consultancy Eco-Age as the luxury retailer seeks to drive positive social and environmental change across its own business and within its supply chain.

The retailer, which is celebrating its 30th anniversary, has been working with Eco-Age in recent months to help understand and manage its environmental and social risk and has decided to enter into a formal partnership to develop "a comprehensive sustainability programme with the aim of placing sustainable and ethical practices at the heart of what it does".

Co-founder and executive co-chairman Ruth Chapman said Matchesfashion "wanted to be sure the business was looking to the future of the industry, the second largest polluter in the planet". "With our reputation for pioneering and nurturing fashion talent we are proud to continue to innovate by focusing our energies on addressing some of these issues within our own business and our broader supply chain," Chapman said.

"We hope to bring awareness to our brands, employees and customers and therefore spearhead change, however incremental, over the coming years. Eco-Age are without doubt the best partners for us to learn from as we begin this project,” she added.

Livia Firth, founder and creative director, Eco-Age said: "I have so much admiration for Ruth and Tom Chapman as they demonstrated leadership through Matchesfashion.com all along. The sustainability journey they have now embarked upon is not an easy task for a multi-brand retailer but the direct engagement both internally and externally of the Matchesfashion.com ethos is fundamental to the success of it. This is such a unique opportunity to make a real change."

Matchesfashion.com, which was founded by Tom and Ruth Chapman in Wimbledon Village in 1987, has grown into a global force in luxury retail. It announced earlier this month that it had agreed a sale of the majority of the business to private equity house Apax Partners in a deal reported to be worth £800m.