Carry Somers (born 1966) is a British author, fashion designer, social entrepreneur, sustainability expert and campaigner. She is founder of Fashion Revolution global movement and was previously founder and director of Pachacuti. Somers is also the author of The Nature of Fashion (Chelsea Green, September 2025), a comprehensive exploration of the history of plant-based textiles and their impact on human societies and the natural environment. She is a Churchill Fellow and holds an Honorary Doctorate of Letters.
Somers’s work explores the intersection of textiles, sustainability, and cultural history, with a focus on public engagement and education. Her book The Nature of Fashion (Chelsea Green/Rizzoli 2025) examines the deep-rooted relationship between plants and textiles, and investigates the ecological implications of material choices across the fashion industry.
She has collaborated with institutions such as the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew on events like the Material World Festival, which highlights the cultural and ecological significance of plant-based materials. In 2025, she contributed as a lead artist to Kew's Community Open Week. In 2024, she was closely involved in shaping The Good Clothes Show,[8] a national event promoting sustainable fashion practices.
Somers is also associated with League of Artisans, a collective that supports traditional textile practices through community projects such as Leek Textile Week. Her work often centres on storytelling, heritage craft, and sustainable material systems, connecting environmental themes with cultural narratives.
Fashion Revolution
Somers founded Fashion Revolution following the Rana Plaza disaster in Bangladesh on 24 April 2013,[9][10] initiating what has since become the world's largest fashion activism movement. Fashion Revolution campaigns for greater transparency, sustainability, and ethics in the fashion industry, with a particular focus on global supply chains.[11]
As part of the movement’s advocacy, Somers has convened roundtable discussions on ethics and sustainability at the UK Parliament, including the 2015 event Ethical Fashion 2020: A New Vision for Transparency[12] and Fashion Question Time, held annually from 2015 to 2018 in Parliament and in 2019 at the V&A.[13]
She regularly speaks in the UK and internationally on supply chain transparency, workers' rights, and environmental issues in fashion.[14][15][16][17][18][19]
In February 2022, Somers appeared on a billboard campaign during New York Fashion Week spotlighting women-led social enterprises in fashion. Her image featured on the Nasdaq billboard in Times Square and outside the United Nations.[21]
She also collaborated with garden designer Lottie Delamain on the Textile Garden for Fashion Revolution, which was awarded a Silver Gilt medal at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show in May 2022.[22]
Pachacuti
Somers founded the fair trade hat brand Pachacuti in 1992,[23] a pioneering company in ethical fashion. It was the first business to be verified under the World Fair Trade Organization (WFTO) Sustainable Fair Trade Management System,[24][25] which certifies ethical and sustainable practices throughout the supply chain.[26] Pachacuti’s products were labelled Verified Fair Trade (WFTO UK0001-2009 to 2012).[27][28]
Between 2009 and 2012, Pachacuti piloted the European Union's Geo Fair Trade project, which tracked over 60 social, economic, and environmental indicators. The initiative mapped the GPS coordinates of 154 weavers’ homes in Ecuador, local Carludovica palmata fields, and regional processing centres.[29][30]
In September 2013, at London Fashion Week, Pachacuti and People Tree Ltd. became the first brands to launch products under the WFTO Fair Trade Guarantee System.[31]
Media and Public Appearances
Somers has appeared regularly on UK and international television and radio to discuss ethical fashion, sustainability, and transparency. Her media contributions include interviews on BBC World Business News, BBC Breakfast, Radio 4, and international broadcasters such as Newstalk ZB (New Zealand) and WBUR (United States).[32][33][34]
She has also been profiled or interviewed in international publications including Forbes, Vogue, Newsweek, El País, the Financial Times, and The Daily Telegraph, where she has spoken on the future of sustainable fashion and the impact of the Rana Plaza disaster.[35][36][37]
Lectures and Presentations
Somers is a frequent speaker at conferences and public forums on fashion, sustainability, and ethics. She has delivered keynote addresses and participated in panels at events including The Economist Impact Summit in Athens, The King’s Foundation sustainability conference, and the Textile Society’s annual conference. Internationally, she has spoken to audiences across Latin America, including a crowd of 5,000 at Trimarchi, one of the region’s largest design festivals.[38]
In addition to academic and design conferences, Somers has presented on cruise lecture circuits in Latin America and the Caribbean, speaking on topics such as textiles, traditional dress, indigenous craft, and fair trade practices.[39][30]
Publications
Somers is the author of The Nature of Fashion (Chelsea Green/Rizzoli 2025), a book exploring the relationship between plants, textiles, and the ecological consequences of material choices.[40]
In 2024, she published A Dictionary of Plant Fibre and Colour, based on research undertaken during her Churchill Fellowship.[41]
Earlier works include her 2015 introduction to Fixing Fashion, a critique of consumerism and fast fashion, and contributions to the 2014 publications Working Ethically, a guide for socially responsible business owners, and Sustainable Luxury and Social Entrepreneurship, an edited volume on ethical enterprise in the luxury sector.[42][43]
Business accomplishments
Somers has received national and international recognition for her contributions to ethical fashion and sustainable business practices. In 2023, she was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to research plant-based fibres and dyes.[41] In 2022, she received an honorary Doctor of Letters from Keele University for her leadership in fair trade and sustainability, and was named an honoree by the Conscious Fashion Campaign in New York.[44]
She won the Luxury Sustainability Award at the 2020 Luxury Law Awards[45] and has been included in several “most influential” lists, including The Progress 1000 by the Evening Standard in 2016.[46]
Earlier in her career, Somers received multiple awards for her leadership in sustainable fashion, including the Observer Ethical Award (2011), Source Award for Outstanding Contribution to Sustainable Fashion (2013), and recognition from the University of Essex as Alumna of the Year (2009). In 2007, she was invited to Buckingham Palace in recognition of her contribution to UK business.
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