In the former textile hub of Roubaix, northern France, a new school just opened. VEJA, the French sneaker brand known for its transparent supply chains, has opened L'École de la Réparation. This vocational academy pays twenty students a minimum wage for ten months of intensive training in design, cobblery and textile repair in-demand skills in a country that reimburses consumers for getting items fixed instead of buying new ones.The project stems from a decade-long partnership between VEJA co-founder Sébastien Kopp and Stéphanie Calvino, founder of the Anti_Fashion Project collective. Since 2015, the pair have been placing young people from disadvantaged backgrounds into roles at VEJA's shops and workshops. Their latest venture takes that commitment further: students are paid a salary while taking 1,400 hours of coursework across thirty-five-hour weeks. Thirty fashion brands have already signed on as partners and sponsors.TREND BITETraditional CSR often treats social problems as external issues requiring charitable intervention. L'École de la Réparation demonstrates how brands can instead build systems that create value for all stakeholders. By paying students while training them in increasingly valuable repair skills, Veja has developed a model that simultaneously addresses youth unemployment, environmental waste and skills shortages.As consumers increasingly scrutinize corporate purpose claims, initiatives that redistribute resources and create lasting infrastructure are likely to resonate more deeply than surface-level campaigns or token donations. And that goes double for Gen Z, speaking to their intersectional view of sustainability: environment + social equity + personal empowerment.Viewed through a wider lens, repair is a cultural metaphor. We live in a time of fractured politics, social inequality and climate anxiety. A brand championing the art of repair taps into a deep emotional desire: if we can fix shoes, maybe we can fix bigger systems, too.
