British fashion designer Stella McCartney also sees her industry as having an obligation in the fight against pollution and climate change.

"Sadly, we are one of the most polluting industries," said the 50-year-old on the sidelines of the UN climate conference in Glasgow in an interview with the AFP news agency.

She now wants to show that "there is another way and we have some solutions".

According to a study by the World Resources Institute, the fashion industry, the second largest manufacturing sector in the world, is responsible for up to eight percent of the world's carbon emissions.

It doesn't have to stay that way, thinks Paul and Linda McCartney's daughter.

For this, the fashion houses would only have to "replace bad business models with good ones," she said.

Since entering the industry three decades ago, the pioneer in sustainable and ethical luxury fashion has never used leather products.

An installation in an art gallery in Glasgow shows the substitute materials she works with, including vegan leather extracted from the mycelium of forest mushrooms.

The exhibition also drew prominent visitors and environmentalists such as Prince Charles and Leonardo DiCaprio.

"Over $ 500 billion worth of trash"

McCartney believes that substitutes are a good selling point: all people need to know is that "hundreds of millions of animals are killed every year for fashion, leather, hides and animal glue."

In addition, working with substitutes is "more pleasant", added the convinced vegan: "Who wants to work in a slaughterhouse?"

Stella McCartney does the same with her commitment to more sustainable fashion.

“People wear fast fashion up to three times, then they throw it away,” she said.

"And that creates garbage worth over $ 500 billion." 

The fight against it is a business model for them.

“I'm trying to turn that around like, 'Hey, you know what?

Take the trash and I'll show you a hoodie that I can make entirely from trash. '" 

McCartney sees the greatest challenge, however, in getting sustainable clothing to the billions of potential wearers in the world.

There are "workable solutions", "we just have to make the world aware of them." 

McCartney mainly focuses on the younger generation.

Just as the taste in fashion changes, so does the awareness of what is in clothing.

"I think we are at a stage where we are quickly becoming irrelevant (...) and Generation X, Y and Z will no longer accept harmful fashion".