Fashion Icon Vivienne Westwood Gets Her Toes Wet in Vegetarian Campaign

In honor of World Water Day, Vivienne Westwood has forgone fashion in  favor of her birthday suit in a new video about the meat industry’s depletion of  world water supplies. “I am an eco-warrior, but I take long showers with a clean  conscience because I’m vegetarian,” says Westwood as she bathes in the video.

An impassioned environmentalist, Vivienne reveals that the meat trade  squanders global water supplies by diverting rivers and depleting our scarce  natural resources. She explains that it takes 16 pounds of grain—and all the  water and land that goes with it—to produce just 1 pound of meat. And backing up  Vivienne’s crusade to save our planet is a recent European study―cited in a New  York Times piece titled “Meat Makes the Planet Thirsty“―reporting that it takes 4  million gallons of water to produce 1 ton of beef but only 85,000 gallons to  produce 1 ton of vegetables. The United Nations has also chimed in by calling for a  global move toward a meat- and dairy-free diet. Says Vivienne, “By avoiding  meat, you do more for the environment than recycling or driving a hybrid car  combined.”

Although Vivienne can shower guilt-free (after all, 1 pound of meat requires  as much water as six months of showers), she actually prefers not to. She  divulges in our exclusive interview below, “Normally at home, I’m not used to  the habit of a shower. I just wash my bits and rush out in the morning. I more  often than not get in the bath after Andreas.” Check out the behind-the scenes  footage below:

Vivienne’s interview highlights the urgency in the crisis we face. She says, “I  do believe we are an endangered species, and we actually need to think what  we’re doing, not just that it’s a choice, we can take it or leave it. Otherwise  it will be mass extinction in a few generations. It won’t be the animals.” Luckily, going vegetarian can help us avert these dangers while sparing animals immense suffering on factory farms and in  slaughterhouses and improving our health.