Lily Cole has never found modelling particularly “challenging”.
Lily Cole bonded with Dame Vivienne Westwood over their environmental activism
The 36-year-old model was scouted when she was just 14 years old and though she was one of the most high-profile fashion figures of the early 2000s, the flame-haired beauty insisted it wasn’t something she was passionate about.
She told Grazia magazine: “I never followed fashion, it just seemed to follow me.
“The act of modelling is not the most challenging work. I always have a good book with me.”
Lily made a surprise appearance at Burberry’s A/W 24 runway show in February and explained she was “charmed” by the fashion house’s offer to consider her personal ethics in her outfit.
She explained: “I did it because they offered to make me vegan leather boots so I was quite charmed by that.
“And they send me the work they do on sustainability. They still have a long way to go, but they are trying.
“It does feel like a past life.”
Lily’s environmental activism is at the heart of her work these days and she admitted her passion helped her forge a bond with the late Vivienne Westwood, who she attended the 2013 Met Gala with.
She said: “We always got on. All of our conversations were about the environment and different social issues, I don’t think we ever talked about fashion.
“She got really into Taoism at the end of her life and it would say you have a body that exists after death and you still exist in the influence you have.
“I feel like Vivienne has a vast continuation body – in the fashion world, but also in her activism and words – it’s still rippling out.”
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