The head of sustainability at accessories brand Mulberry, Rosie Wollacott Phillips, has said the company will be sourcing all of its leather from “environmentally credited” by 2023, writes Leatherbiz.

In recent comments she gave to luxury industry organisation Walpole, Ms Wollacott Phillips said she had joined Mulberry in 2010 and began working in sustainability in 2017. One of the first tasks she carried out in sustainability was to calculate how much of the leather it was buying at the time came from tanners that had gained accreditation from a recognised environmental initiative.

Her enquiries suggested that the proportion of leather that Mulberry sourced from these tanneries for its spring-summer 2018 collection was only 8%. In four years, this has risen to 88%, with only one leather supplier remaining that has not yet gained the accreditation. This manufacturer has applied to undergo the necessary audits but has had to reschedule these a number of times in the last 18 months.

She said she was confident this leather manufacturer would come through the audits successfully and take Mulberry’s score to 100%.