A luxury interiors brand has appointed a director to its board to represent nature and future generations of both people and animals, in a bid to give people and planet a legal say in company decisions.
House of Hackney announced yesterday it had worked with enviornmental law collective Lawyers for Nature to appoint a legal representative for ‘mother nature’ and ‘future generations’ to its boardroom.
Frieda Gormley, co-founder of House of Hackney, said the firm wanted to hold itself to a “high level of legal accountability” for the impact its operations had on nature and future generations’ quality of life.
“At House of Hackney, we have been asking ourselves ‘what would nature say?’,” she said. “For so long nature has been viewed as an extractive resource which has now gone beyond a critical point of sustainability, and we all have a responsibility to resolve this. Recognising that nature has a voice to challenge and drive positive decision making will help guide our responsibility for change.”
House of Hackney is not the first company to give the natural world a legal position on its board. Beauty brand Faith in Nature appointed “nature” to its board of directors in 2022.
The brands’ shake-up of corporate convention forms part of a growing nature rights movement that aims to give rivers, mountains, and other natural assets legal personhood, just like corporations and citizens.
Brontie Ansell, co-founder of Lawyers for Nature, will represent ‘mother nature’ and ‘future generations’ at House of Hackney board meetings.
“My role here is to be a conduit and a voice for mother nature and future generations, with the freedom to consult a wide network of experts as and when required,” she said. “The system of this is designed in a way to avoid bias both personally, professionally and financially, and to provide a truly ethical view of the business and all decisions made.”
The brand said it defined ‘mother nature’ as the personification of nature – all the animals, plants, ecosystems and other things not made by humans, and all the events and processes not caused by humans.
Future generations, meanwhile, are taken to encompass all future generations of humans, plants, and animals on Earth from today’s date. Their representation on the board would ensure business activity aims to drive “a liveable, thriving world for tomorrow”, House of Hackney said.
The news came as the Body Shop announced it was launching a major campaign, alongside its long-time partner Cruelty Free International, to call on the government to halt the “silent reintroduction” of animal testing in the UK.
Animal testing for certain cosmetic products has been allowed since 2019, after the government aligned with a new set of EU chemicals regulations that overturned an absolute ban on testing of all cosmetic ingredients that has been in place in the UK since 1998.
A subsequent court case brought by Cruelty Free International saw the animal testing ban partially re-introduced – but only for ingredients exclusively used in cosmetics.
The Body Shop and Cruelty Free International are now calling for an outright ban on animal testing for all cosmetics, noting that currently, just 20 per cent of products used in make-up are covered by the ban.
“It’s an outrage that the Home Office has silently been issuing permits for animal testing, despite its clear public commitment over 25 years ago to a full ban,” said Chris Davis, sustainainability, activisim and communications director at the Body Shop. “We and our partners started this fight against animal testing a long time ago, and our resolve is stronger than ever to see it through today.”
The Body Shop said it would be reviving a range of ‘Against Animal Testing’ t-shirts from its previous 1998 campaign against animal testing, as well as running in-store campaigns from December to urge customers to “join the fight”.
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