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Inside The Foundation

We are
on a mission...

We do not inhabit several worlds, but only one: connected by the currents, unified by the waters, fragile in its balance.
At the Vilebrequin Foundation, we work to protect turtles and aquatic ecosystems — with consistency, by supporting research, raising awareness, and supporting the solutions of tomorrow.
You don't have to be a biologist or engineer to take action. All it takes is an attentive look, an enlightened gesture, a sincere commitment. Because every voice counts in building a future where aquatic life can continue to regenerate — slowly but surely.

Manifesto
What if slowness was the true strength of life?

Our oceans are the beating heart of the Earth. They hold a rich, complex, infinitely vibrant ecosystem. They nourish the planet, shape climates, and shelter a diversity of life forms that is as fragile as it is precious. And yet, as vast and powerful as they may seem to us, they are giants with feet of clay. Today, their future is at stake.

Symbols of slowness, resilience, and longevity, turtles embody another way of inhabiting the planet, based on balance, patience, and transmission. For millions of years, they have traversed the oceans and rivers with calm and constancy, crossing the ages as witnesses to the fragile balances between species and environments. Surviving climate change, they carry within them the deep memory of our planet. They embody a natural wisdom and remind us that it takes time to preserve life, true sentinels of the health of aquatic ecosystems. By protecting them, it is an entire world we wish to defend.

Through its actions in awareness, research, innovation, and conservation, the Vilebrequin Foundation invites us to relearn the rhythm of life, the one that gives nature time to regenerate: more patient, more attentive, more sustainable. It is thus committed to preserving turtles, as well as the environments on which they depend and all the fauna and flora that compose them.

Our
promise

Turtles are the mirror of an unbalanced ocean, the revelation of a world that is running out of steam.
By taking them as its icon, the Vilebrequin Foundation is committed to defending the very conditions of aquatic life — those that allow living things to last, to regenerate, to breathe. Our promise: to act patiently over time, against the rush of the modern world, to restore the balance of life in the long term.

Our actions are based on three axes:

Preserving biodiversity at the rhythm of life, by protecting turtles and the aquatic ecosystems of which they are the sentinels.
Passing on to the younger generations as an act of regeneration, cultivating attention, patience, and a link with the living, by raising awareness among young people, supporting research, and creating bridges between science, art and nature.
Reinventing respectful fashion, by supporting those who rethink creation in a logic of sustainability, circularity and environmental requirements.

What's at stake

If there is one thing that we know for certain, it’s that our oceans need our help. There are already an estimated 500 dead zones in the oceans—areas rendered completely inhospitable to plant and marine life by pollution. To put this issue into perspective, together, these dead zones account for an area about the size of the United Kingdom. Scientists predict that there will be more plastic waste than fish in our oceans by 2050, and that in the absence of significant changes, we stand to lose more than half of the world’s marine species by 2100.

With only 8% of their waters under formal protection, it is up to the sum of humanity to do their part to ensure that future generations may continue to find joy and inspiration in their depths. True, the problems are many. Pollution, plastic waste, overfishing, poor consumption habits—all these things need to change. The good news is that it is totally within all our power to make a difference.

Our crew

Dr. Cécile Gaspar

Founder, Director of Strategy and conservation programs Te Mana O Te Moana Foundation.

Philippe Mondielli

Directeur Scientifique / Scientific Director Fondation Prince Albert II de Monaco.

Pascale Siegrist Mussard

Pascale Siegrist Mussard is the driving force behind Petit h, a creative laboratory that gives a second life to workshop offcuts and remnants from Hermès.