Stella McCartney On Her CSM Graduate Show, Her Noughties Chloé Designs And Being Fashion's First...

Reference: See here

At just 25, the designer became the creative director of Chloé , following in the footsteps of Karl Lagerfeld, who commented that the French fashion house had appointed a big name "in music, not fashion". That didn't faze McCartney, though. "I think I was really naive," McCartney reflected. "Honestly it sounds ridiculous now, I was like, nobody will notice if I take this job because Chloé was not a cool house [at the time]." Of course, people did take notice, with McCartney's Noughties Chloé designs still being extremely covetable today. How did it feel to prove the critics wrong? "I'm still proving people wrong," she replied. "It's always been the case of feeling like I had to prove myself."

Even as a young designer, McCartney was very aware of the environmental impact of fashion, refusing to use leather in her collections. "I knew from day one, I wasn't going to be hypocritical," she said. Nowadays, she promotes a series of innovative materials at her brand, from mushroom leather to bio-based algae sequins. "I'm a glass half full kind of person," she replied, when asked about the future of fashion. "I have hope when I meet the young innovators I'm working with, when we're finding solutions."