Club Yu Mei: The Regeneration Issue

In this issue, we expand on the idea of Regeneration, and what it means in the lives and businesses of our Club Yu Mei members. For Sinead Boucher, it means leading Aotearoa’s largest media organisation from the perspective of the B Corporation framework, and for writer Isabelle Truman it means finding new pieces for her wardrobe via Depop or Vestiaire. We also speak to the likes of multi-disciplinary artist Raukura Turei, ENTIRE director and co-founder Sebastian Hunt, artist Ruby Wilkinson and more.

We're also thrilled to present our Regeneration Roadmap—a guide of where we're at in the regeneration space and where we still want to go. At Yu Mei, we have taken a holistic approach at looking at our impact, and while this has included achieving Toitū Carbon Net-Zero Certification, and submitting our B Corp Impact assessment for audit we believe that impact traverses far more broad territory.

In our Roadmap, we’ve brought in industry voices to help shape what we are doing in this space and offer some ways that you as our Club Yu Mei members can tangibly engage in Regenerative processes yourselves. We’ve included words from Beckie Calder-Flynn, an environmental scientist on the leather vs. alternatives debate, and we talk to Blanche Morrogh on her community based approach to doing business. Sustainability strategist Jacinta FitzGerald speaks to the importance of circularity, while tanner Barry Parsons goes into detail on the tanning process.

This is our stake in the ground, our progress report as of the day we went to print—but this Regeneration Roadmap is ever evolving, and we’re constantly learning new things that will inevitably take us in new directions. We hope you enjoy the stories about our materials, processes and ambitions in this issue.