Creating Sustainable Fabrics From Textile Waste

The more innovative we are creating sustainable fabrics for fashionable clothing, the more likely we will be to create a better market. maake explores how the UK addresses sustainability in textiles and finds a few more innovative companies making fabric from food and textile waste for economic reasons.

New Innovations, New Fabrics

We have also given you lots of feedback regarding circularity and manufacturing fashion textiles in our sustainability blog review series. But another innovative way of making fashion clothing greener involves producing textiles from waste. It’s taking other people’s refuse and transforming it into treasures. Let’s explore how fashion houses and textiles manufacturers are doing this.

A recent innovation, Textiles 2030 is an NGO that focuses on supporting companies and organisations in the fashion and textiles industries to “find circularity solutions and overcome shared challenges”. This way, the NGO hopes to voluntarily create a more sustainable, circular existence for fabric by 2030 and lessen the impact of fast fashion clothing on the planet.

By collaborating with other companies against fast fashion, Textiles 2030 hopes to stop climate change by the end of this decade. And being at the halfway mark, that’s a mammoth task. First steps involve researching, innovating and designing systems in collaboration with other businesses.

Their statistics tell the story of why this is so important, so let’s explore:

·      711000 tonnes of post-consumer textiles are discarded in the general textile waste every year in the United Kingdom, mainly thanks to fast fashion.

·      8-10% of global green house gas emissions in Britain come from the textiles industry.

·      This industry uses 93 billion cubic metres of water every year.

The Current Textile Waste Footprint

Manufacturing fabric and textiles involves various processes and depends on the type of fabrics and product items, how those items are made, and where. Textiles 2030 realised the importance of calculating the “overall carbon and water impacts and savings associated”. The NGO has done intensive research to provide a “representative, relevant and accurate” estimate they call the Textiles 2030 Footprint Tool & Methods Report. This report started, along with Textiles 2030, at the beginning of this decade, and is currently in its fifth year.

According to statistics, The United Kingdom’s fashion and textiles sector currently supports around 1.3 million jobs – one in every 25 jobs in Britain! This industry is one of the largest sectors in the country, and its influence extends all over the earth.

The British Fashion & Textile Association (UKFT) is the country’s largest network for recycling textiles, bringing together global and British brands, designers, manufacturers and suppliers. “With a growing focus on sustainability and innovation,” UKFT tells us, they are “driving meaningful action in the transition to a circular economy.”

This organisation represents the British fashion clothing industry, “from jeans, Savile Row suits and designer dresses through to medical masks, upholstered car seats and next-generation fabrics”.

They made a circular manufacturing report discussing the way forward for the industry, the importance of sustainability and a shift towards circularity in the light of fast fashion. One of their main focuses is embracing and integrating new technologies and innovations for recycled material and clothes to be made.

We’ve written reams about why sustainability in textiles is so important, which you can read right here.

Recycling Plants & Foods Into Sustainable Fabrics

As time goes by and we sit in year five of 10 to 2030, what can be done to transform waste into fabric? The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates that one-third of all global edible objects are wasted. So, using it for textiles to be made is a brilliant sustainable innovation!

1.     Oranges into Organic Fibre

Italian company Orange Fibre takes ‘pastazzo’ – the citrus pulp and peels remaining from fruit after making juice out of it – and transforms this cellulose into a ‘silk-like yarn’, a textile fibre that can either be used on its own or blended with other fibers for recycling material to be made. This organic fabric, called “TENCEL™ Limited Edition x Orange Fiber” is made in Sicily in a sustainable closed loop process. The company was founded in Catania a long time ago, in 2014. Designer brands using these textiles include Salvatore Ferragamo.

2.     Recycling Nettles Into Sustainable Material

There are 3 different nettle plants made into future textiles – these include European nettle, Ramie and Himalayan nettle. The fibre from these nettle plants is processed into alternatives for plastic in various global countries such as Japan, Scandinavia, Germany, China, Russia and Poland. One of the reasons for this plant’s popularity is that it is much more sustainable to grow than cotton and hemp, which requires far more water and pesticides.

Some of the fabric made from nettle plants has been likened to fine silk with a breathable structure.

3.     Kapok to Organic Textile

Another silk-like textile is made from kapok fibers, which is breathable, water-resistant, lightweight and hypoallergenic. The process required to transform kapok into textiles is a long one, carried out in Cambodia using Bombax Ceiba’s fruits. The trees grow up to 164 feet high and can produce around 4,000 fruits each season. Very little water is used in the transformation process from fruit to a kapok-cotton blend materials. As this particular organic fibre takes a long time to be manufactured into fabric, it’s used mainly to lightweight thermal clothes to be made using cotton and other blends.

4.     Coffee Grounds – No Longer Waste

Transforming coffee grounds into organic textiles involves collecting these grounds, drying them and then processing them into yarn and fabric. These types of materials are likely to be worn as it’s known for its UV protection. It dries fast, so clothes like activewear and footwear brands like to use it.

For more textile innovations, view our latest guide.

Follow our Lead With Textiles Recycling

At maake, our primary focus is on sustainability. With our Fabric Waste initiative, We do our utmost to eliminate waste by textile recycling, and we try to be ‘eco friendly’ in every possible way: 

· We Focus on Sustainability & Innovation: We consider our environmental impact when we print on fabric. We use as little water and energy as possible, and reduce waste. We use a 100% renewable energy source. The energy we use to print is less than it takes to use a home fan heater. Also, the inks we use for printing are all environmentally friendly and toxin-free.

· Zero Waste: We offer customers free upcycling units and give excess cotton and other recycled material to local charities, schools, and educational institutions.

· We Save Energy: We use energy-saving cut-off switches on all our printing and manufacturing machines, so they consume less energy when not in use.

· We ‘Buy Local’: We care about buying local, so we purchase everything we need for our business in our area. Customers can also pick these up from our North London mill, reducing our carbon footprint further as it takes less time to transport this way.

· We Have a Safe, Clean Working Environment: Our team enjoys safe, healthy working conditions. And all earn the London Living Wage.

· We Shop Small: As a small company in the textile industry, we understand how important it is to back small businesses. Check out our Guide to Environmentally Friendly Textile Printing.

· We Control Textile Waste: We encourage clients and colleagues to give recycled organic or regular textiles such as cotton a second life and become more environmentally aware. Our Textile Waste initiative gives like-minded people in our industry a chance to act against waste by donating recycled textiles to charities, schools and customers. If you’d like to become a volunteer, contact us here.