Back to Blog
Sustainable Materials in the Fashion Industry - Renewcell - Circulose®
Sustainability in the fashion industry is important but even more we need to go into circularity. The textile industry does not have enough technology for circularity. Majority of brands have a sustainability agenda, but very aggressive way they would like to make this happen now. The problem is the technologies have not existed.
About 35 years ago they did not recycle paper at all, and everybody was saying that recycling of paper destroys the fibers and it is not possible to make a strong paper. But, today almost 60% of all papers are recycled and the industry worth 58 billion dollars. That is exactly the way we are going in the textile industry. Although it is going to go a lot faster because consumer and brand driven. The fashion industry and designers can help sustainable revolution for circularity.
How the increasing demands on fashion become sustainable? Circular economy is pushing the boundaries of material, handling and fabric innovation creating a close production loop. Technology has always been an integral part of fashion. 200 years ago, during the industrial revolution power looms completely transformed the manufacturing of clothing materials which made weaving and mass production of clothes possible fast forward to today and we are starting to see the beginning of a new revolution. An eco-friendlier way of producing fashion. The Swedish company Renewcell which is backed by H&M Group among others is part of global vanguard in this area. Innovating and creating fabrics from recycled clothes. They launched Circulose a new natural material based on recycled cotton fibers which now used by H&M and Levi’s Jeans. Their expertise is taking cotton clothes and making that into new pulp which can be used for making Lyocell or viscose. Renewcell company create the raw material for the fabrics. As we know, cotton fiber is a very particular fiber because it is very durable and strong to separate those fibers is not easy. The core of Renewcell’s innovation which is also patented. Levi’s High Loose Jeans consists of 60% cotton and 40% of viscose. The jeans feel like cotton, look like cotton. This is just the first step in the journey of creating sustainable jeans. H&M launched the blue dress in March 2019.
