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Gucci's CEO is Stepping Down as its French Parent Shakes up Leadership

FILE - Gucci President Marco Bizzarri, gestures as he attends a conference titled 'The Innovation Summit', in Milan, Italy, on July 3, 2017. Bizzarri is stepping down later this year, the latest shakeup to the luxury fashion brand and coming as part of a series of changes to the French conglomerate Kering that owns it. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno, File)
FILE - Gucci President Marco Bizzarri, gestures as he attends a conference titled 'The Innovation Summit', in Milan, Italy, on July 3, 2017. Bizzarri is stepping down later this year, the latest shakeup to the luxury fashion brand and coming as part of a series of changes to the French conglomerate Kering that owns it. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno, File)
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Gucci's CEO is Stepping Down as its French Parent Shakes up Leadership

FILE - Gucci President Marco Bizzarri, gestures as he attends a conference titled 'The Innovation Summit', in Milan, Italy, on July 3, 2017. Bizzarri is stepping down later this year, the latest shakeup to the luxury fashion brand and coming as part of a series of changes to the French conglomerate Kering that owns it. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno, File)
FILE - Gucci President Marco Bizzarri, gestures as he attends a conference titled 'The Innovation Summit', in Milan, Italy, on July 3, 2017. Bizzarri is stepping down later this year, the latest shakeup to the luxury fashion brand and coming as part of a series of changes to the French conglomerate Kering that owns it. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno, File)

The president and CEO of Gucci is stepping down later this year, the latest shakeup to the luxury fashion brand and coming as part of a series of changes to its parent company, the French conglomerate Kering.

Marco Bizzarri will depart the Italian design house in September after eight years at the helm, with Kering saying Tuesday that he "masterminded the execution of Gucci’s outstanding growth strategy since 2015." He was part of Kering's leadership for 18 years, The Associated Press reported.

Bizzarri will be replaced by Jean-François Palus, who is now Kering's managing director. Palus will be “tasked with strengthening Gucci’s teams and operations” as the brand “rebuilds influence and momentum,” according to the company's statement.

Historically, Gucci accounted for most of Kering’s profits, but it has been under some scrutiny after underperforming rivals.

Kering also said it was promoting Yves Saint Laurent President and CEO Francesca Bellettini as deputy CEO for brand development, managing all of its fashion houses, which also include Balenciaga, Alexander McQueen and Bottega Veneta.

Kering Chief Financial Officer Jean-Marc Duplaix will be another deputy CEO, handling operations and finance.

“We are building a more robust organization to fully capture the growth of the global luxury market," billionaire Kering Chairman and CEO François-Henri Pinault said in a statement.

He said Bellettini drove revenue at Saint Laurent six times higher, while Palus, who's taking over at Gucci, “will now focus his energy on getting our largest asset in top shape.”

Pinault thanked the departing Bizzarri “for his spectacular contribution to the success of Gucci and of Kering.”

The changes open questions about the future of the larger fashion conglomerate and especially of Gucci, whose creative director of eight years, Alessandro Michele, left the brand last November, citing “different perspectives." He redefined Gucci’s codes with romanticism and gender-fluidity.

It marks a clean start at Gucci: Bizzarri arrived when Michele was promoted in 2015 in a complete revamp of the fashion house and now is leaving eight months after the creative director.

Recent Gucci collections have been designed by an in-house team, but the fashion world is awaiting the brand’s first collection by new creative director Sabato De Sarno, formerly part of the team at Valentino, to be unveiled in September.

 

 

 

 

 

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Fashion

Sweden Drowns in Discarded Fast Fashion Items

A worker sorts incoming clothing items at Artikel2 sorting center in Stockholm on April 10, 2025. (Photo by Jonathan NACKSTRAND / AFP)
A worker sorts incoming clothing items at Artikel2 sorting center in Stockholm on April 10, 2025. (Photo by Jonathan NACKSTRAND / AFP)
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Sweden Drowns in Discarded Fast Fashion Items

A worker sorts incoming clothing items at Artikel2 sorting center in Stockholm on April 10, 2025. (Photo by Jonathan NACKSTRAND / AFP)
A worker sorts incoming clothing items at Artikel2 sorting center in Stockholm on April 10, 2025. (Photo by Jonathan NACKSTRAND / AFP)

Sweden's recycling centers are overflowing with clothes after an EU-wide ban this year on throwing away textiles, leaving overwhelmed municipalities eager to have fast fashion giants take responsibility.

"It's a huge amount coming in everyday. It's been crazy, it's a huge increase," said Brian Kelly, secretary general of the Artikel2 charity shop in Stockholm, where rows of bins were overfilled with discarded apparel.

Since the beginning of this year, EU countries must have separate textile recycling, alongside existing processes for glass, paper and food waste.

The aim is to promote circular waste management, where textiles are sorted and reused, or recycled if they are not too damaged.

"We have seen a 60-percent increase in textiles collected in January and February this year compared with the same period last year," said Karin Sundin, an expert on textile waste at Stockholm city's waste and recycling management company Stockholm Vatten och Avfall.

Once the textiles are sorted, some 60 to 70 percent is designated for reuse, and 20 to 30 percent for recycling as padding, isolation or composite materials.

Around seven to 10 percent is burned for energy, according to the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency.

That is a huge improvement from before the new law, according to experts, who note that discarded clothing used to be systematically incinerated.

However, a lack of infrastructure in Sweden means used clothes are largely exported abroad, primarily to Lithuania, where they are sorted, reused, or burned for energy.

"We don't have the big sorting plants that can put everything into value in the same way that they have in eastern Europe for example," explained Sundin.

"The reason is that it's so labor intensive (and) costs a lot of money," she said as she gave AFP a tour of the Ostberga recycling center in southern Stockholm.

Swedes throw away 90,000 tons of textiles per year, or 10 kilograms (22 pounds) per person, according to the Swedish Society for the Conservation of Nature.

The EU average is 19 kilograms, according to 2022 statistics, up from 17 in 2019, data from the European Environment Agency showed.

The clothing industry also pollutes the environment.

To make a t-shirt that weighs 135 grammes (4.76 ounces), 2,500 liters (660 gallons) of water and one kilogram (2.2 pounds) of chemicals are needed, noted Yvonne Augustsson, advisor at the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency.

"That means greenhouse gas emissions of around two to five kilos," she said.

"In Sweden, an article of clothing is used on average 30 times. If you double this to 60 times -- which seems reasonable -- you reduce the climate impact by half," she said.

Textile sorting in Sweden is handled by municipalities, many of which have been overburdened by the quantities received since the introduction of the new law.

In the sparsely populated north, some towns, such as Kiruna, continue to incinerate textiles because they have no takers for the items.

Fast fashion giants, such as H&M and Zara, are expected to eventually play a role in handling the waste they help generate, and negotiations are ongoing at the European level to determine their responsibility.

According to a preliminary agreement EU member states reached in February, clothing giants will be responsible for the end of lifetime of the products they sell, required to pay for collection, sorting, reuse and recycling.

The idea is to encourage fast fashion retailers to produce "clothing designed to last longer," said Augustsson.

Swedish brand H&M told AFP it welcomed moves in that direction.

Consumers also need to change their mindset.

Each person should "buy no more than five new articles of clothing per year," said Beatrice Rindevall, head of the Swedish Society for the Conservation of Nature, which regularly organizes clothing swaps.

In the town of Linkoping on a sunny spring day, a clothing exchange on a student campus had racks featuring everything from a hot pink jacket with feathered sleeves to faded jeans, bags and striped t-shirts.

"People can give us clothes in good condition that they don't wear anymore (and) exchange them for something else," volunteer Eva Vollmer said.

"We focus on creating the solution so that people actually have an alternative."