International Women's Day 2026

Charlotte Garbutt
4 days ago
7 min read

The sad reality is the need for it:

an interview with Anna Bergfors for International Women's Day

I had the great privilege of interviewing creative director at StudioBergfors, Anna Bergfors, for International Women's Day. Here, Anna reflects on her personal style evolution, the significance in the current climate of International Women's Day, the need for greater inclusivity in the fashion industry and the challenges the queer community are facing. Read the interview here or scroll to the bottom to watch it.

Anna, please tell us a little about yourself.

Hello, I'm a creative director based in Spain. I've been doing the job for longer than I'd like to think about. I started off in music and worked in fashion, automotive and electronics and I now have a small company with my photographer partner, Edith. We're based in the south of Spain but we tend to go around Europe doing different things, taking pictures, branding. Obviously one of the benefits of being down in South Spain is that the sun shines a lot so it means we can be outside taking pictures pretty much 12 months a year which is beneficial especially to fashion clients because you can do it in spring, summer and in the middle of winter. Having done spring, summer and in winter in Berlin - once in

minus 12 with people wearing very small amounts of clothes - it's much more preferable to not be freezing. Everyone's happier. So there's that and the fact that we're next to the sea and the mountains. We've reached a certain age when quality of life is beneficial. We're currently working on a big photography exhibition for my wife in Madrid, we've got two or three music clients that are keeping us quite busy and some documentaries on environmental issues which should be quite interesting.

Thank you, Anna. As a stylist, I'm interested in how you'd describe your style and whether it's changed over time.

I would say that it's sort of classic graphic designer style of a certain age. It was always a modern minimalism kind of thing. Brands like APC, Cos, Arket. Minimal, simple, materials-focused, silhouette-driven and a bit classic as well. But if you look at how APC started, which was when I was young and when they came to London from Paris in the early 90s, they took a classic sort of workwear functionality but gave it flare. Materials were the key, quality materials, so things last forever and look better as they get older and not the opposite way round.

What I tend to live in when it gets to this time of year - even in Spain it's a bit nippy - will be a roll-neck-and-leather-skirt look. I'll be wearing a sort of designer uniform of black or white, maybe a bit of oatmeal as I am today. But every so often I'll go very lurid and colourful and I'll colour block with oranges and reds and greens and blues. Sometimes it depends on your mood and what kind of person you're going to meet and if you feel like being a bit of a statement, I suppose, and that will probably be a red lip and a headband or a hat or something like that if we're going to a meeting in Madrid. It's always fun in Madrid.

It gets really cold in the winter so we're down here in 18 degrees and up there it's zero. And you can get on a train which a) is quite fun to do and b) you can transform your persona on on a single train journey.

My wife, Edith, is a fashion photographer by trade. She's worked with Versace and Burberry and various other luminaries like Victoria Beckham and so she's a much more extravagant dresser than I am. Her sister's a stylist as well. They curate their looks in a very minute way - how you hang a jumper from a skirt and lengthen a trouser and things like that. I've been a creative director myself, I'm very aware of how you create a photograph to maximise the benefit of what the actual article of clothing is and how that colour palette works in certain situations, how you play off these sort of things. So we take these things quite seriously. Even though we might look a bit monotone sometimes, it's a considered monotone.

Do you feel that your style has changed as your career's developed? Or is it something that you've always had that eye for, those details?

I think so. When you're younger, at least from my perspective, I was kind of a bit more street and a bit scruffier and I liked to look a bit dishevelled. That's a state of mind, I think. And also because I was going to the sort of places that people weren't dishevelled, I liked making myself look dishevelled. But I think when you hit sort of 48, if you look dishevelled, you just look dishevelled. You don't have the bandwidth quite as much to get away with it.

You've lived in lots of different locations. Do you feel that your style is something that remains constant and consistent or do you take influences depending on where you've lived and where you're living currently?

I spent 30 years in middle of London, so we were always in either Covent Garden or Soho, and then it progressed into Shoreditch and Hoxton and places. I never wanted to do something that was so High Street that you could see everyone else wearing it. However, High Street's fantastic when you want to use it as an accessory. Things like jackets. I've

always had a thing for keeping it classic, that you just keep re-wearing when you feel it fits the need.

Then we moved to Berlin which for six months of the year is arctic and for another six months is blisteringly hot. Berlin has a great fashion base: there's a guy called Andreas Murkudis who's got an amazing store in Berlin and he assembles different designers - bits of collections that he puts together and it's a kind of lifestyle shop as much as a fashion brand. Lots of black. There's a bit of a colour there if a tone can be a colour... but that kind of vibe suited that city. When the sun starts really shining here, I tend to be a lot paler. I wear a lot more white just because I think it's physically more pleasant because it affects the heat and it just works.

So if you could tell me, Anna, what International Women's Day means to you.

The sad reality is the need for it. And I think it is more prevalent than ever to be having this conversation. Notwithstanding what's going on with the trans community, is this idea of what a woman is being questioned, with Project 2025, which is basically written by a bunch of... I think they call themselves Christian nationalists, but the easy word is right-wing fascists. That tip of the iceberg thing with trans women - and note the word women - is the beginning, written in black and white, of taking away rights, contraception, working rights, equal pay rights, rights in the home. And we live in scary times, when free speech is the ability to be cruel and rude to someone. So it seems to be there's a rise of idiocy and there's a rise basically of inhumanity. Little statements like Women's Day, anything that can be viewed as a reminder of humanity should be celebrated more because if we had a truly human existence we wouldn't need to have these things in place. But sadly it's more prescient now than for a long, long time. I think that's very sad.

I agree with you, Anna. So you reference trans women. If you have a message for trans women or indeed people more widely in the queer community, what would it be?

Well, I mean, it's very hard, isn't it? I think that the only thing is trying to stay positive, understand that you're not alone. The media - the BBC specifically - need to be seriously questioned at the moment. They seem to have lost all impartiality in terms of queer and trans issues. There seems to be an editorial policy that's coming straight out the White House.

But the thing that I would say is just to know that nothing has changed. The perceived change is a media change, it's a curated change. Decent human beings haven't changed. That machinery is trying to make you think so. But we stand together and don't feel alone and don't feel that there should be a separation between people. If we start classifying ourselves too strongly then we are in danger of othering ourselves.

Thinking about what we have in common is the important thing and the humanity side of things, which in many quarters is being forgotten. That's a salient reminder. You mentioned that you have worked within the fashion sector, if you had a message for the fashion industry, what would it be?

One thing that feels a little bit worrisome is the way that bigger brands seem to be pulling back from their inclusivity, that the idea that DEI [Diversity, Equality & Inclusion] is a bad thing, the idea that 'woke', which essentially means caring for other people and respecting them, seems to be becoming a toxic word. But people have long memories. This stuff is seismic and if a brand starts dropping its ideals and then four years later tries to rekindle them - sticking a rainbow flag on them - then beware. If you show that you're purely motivated by money, then woe betide when the tide turns. Because I think this is a very small - I'm hoping it's a small - blip. You can only hate so many people for so long. So I think it's just don't forget that people have got long memories and if you start trying to view inclusivity as a marketing strategy, it's probably a bad idea.

Thank you. And is there anything else that you would like to share?

I think trying to stay positive. When I visit the UK it's easy to feel put upon and it's very difficult not be touched by the relentless media machine and things like toilet bans, and you can see why so many people are feeling distressed being accused of things as a section of society that are essentially witch-huntings. I'd say try and stay positive, as hard as it is, and that people are generally good as a whole. Don't let some awful people creep in and change that agenda: stay positive and stick together.