Pepa Bueno has climbed Kilimanjaro, collects art, reads, goes to exhibitions and says that sometimes she feels like the replicant of Blade Runner, because she has seen things in Madrid that no one would imagine. Graduated in History of Art and with a half thesis, Bueno has gone from directing the main women’s magazines in Spain to leading one of the most relevant fashion employers’ associations: the Asociación Creadores de Moda de España (Acme).
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‘Drivers’ for recovery
Although she has lived in Madrid for half her life, her Andalusian accent gives her away. Pepa Buena was born into a family in Melilla, where she lived until she was four years old, when she moved to Malaga. His mother’s family had a shoe factory (“that’s why I like shoes so much, I could buy thousands,” he confesses) after the Civil War. “At that time there was nothing, but the skins came to Melilla from Morocco,” he recalls. His father ran a store in the autonomous city that sold haberdashery, footwear and furs.
The oldest of three siblings, Okay He studied Art History in Malaga and when he finished, in 1984, he moved to Madrid to do his thesis with professor Juan Antonio Ramírez, focused on the Spanish pavilions in world exhibitions and the relationship between ideology and architecture.
Pepa Buena was born into a family in Melilla, where she lived until she was four years old, when she moved to Malaga.
At that time, fashion had not yet crossed his path. In the midst of Madrid in the eighties, as Bueno recalls, his partner was Miguel Cereceda, a philosopher specialized in art, so his circle of friends was related to art, philosophy and culture. “We were very hooligans,” he recalls; sometimes I feel like the replicant of Blade Runner, because I’ve seen things in Madrid that you would never dream of, a concert by The Cure, museums, the gallery circuit … ”.
Bueno says that fashion has always interested him. “How we dress is a declaration of intentions: in the eighties we had it very clear”, He claims. Remember that, as a young man, you would go to a men’s store in Malaga to look for shirts and that until recently you have had knitwear that you bought in the nineties.
Bueno has developed the bulk of his career in the media sector, where he was introduced, how could it be otherwise, through art. His first job in the sector was in the art sections of the Elle Déco magazine, which then devoted five pages to this subject.
Bueno has developed the bulk of his career in the media sector, where he was introduced through art
After occupying the position of editor-in-chief of Elle Déco and Vogue Novias, she spent nine years as Woman’s delegate in Madrid, although the newsroom was in Barcelona. “That’s where I really got the hang of it as a journalist,” says Bueno. And, from Woman, to the position that would lead her to her current occupation: the deputy director of YoDona magazine. “Charo Izquierdo, Natalia Bengoechea and I promoted a very strong link with Spanish fashion at YoDona: we believed that the press had to work with the sector, something that happens in all countries, but here there has always been a distance”, he explains. So when he left YoDona and was asked to take over Acme’s reins, it seemed like a natural leap.
The executive has formed a tandem with Modesto Lomba, president of Acme, and her team consists of two more people, although it relies on external providers for different functions and projects. “The good thing about this job is that it is always different; In recent years, in the association we have opened a lot and that means that I have many meetings and that I speak with companies of all kinds ”, he says.
Bueno affirms that his work is actually two: “there is the daily work and then the night work, which starts at seven in the afternoon”. “But everything has changed with Covid-19,” he laments. I have a hard time thinking about how everything is going to be after this ”.
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