The European Environment Agency (EEA) wrote a report on the importance of design in the textile transition to a circular economy in Europe. While the textile industry generates large revenues and employs many Europeans, it highly impacts climate, water, land and raw material use. It needs to enhance its circular transition to reduce its environmental impact. Increasing recycling will not be enough and elements like circular design are crucial. Circular design can increase longevity, durability, resource optimisation, collection, reuse, and recycling. 

In 2019, around 1.5 million people were employed in the textile industry across Europe, generating 162 billion euros in turnover throughout 160,000 companies. The sector has a critical socio-economic importance. However, it is also the 4th most polluting industry in terms of green house gas emissions and it has the 3rd largest impact on water and land use in the EU. It greatly impacts raw material use, ranking 5th among all sectors. 

Due to these significant impacts and the high economic potential of the industry, a transition to the circular economy would be very beneficial. According to the EEA, the priority should be to think about design, reuse, repair and remanufacturing before thinking of recycling. Design for circularity is a relatively recent development of the design for sustainability movement. It relies on policies and consumer behaviour for its development. It increases longevity and durability, optimises resource use, heightens rates of collection and reuse, and increases rates of recycling and material reuse.

Implementing design for circularity:

Durability and Longevity

The design aspects to consider include material choice, colour fastness criteria, fabric resistance, multifunctionality and the availability of repair kits and spare parts.

Resource Use

Circular design principles address the reduction of emission, water, chemical and energy consumption by introducing requirements on recycled content, collection of material for reuse, and recovery systems, each contributing efficiency.

Reuse and Collection

In this area, brands are introducing take-back schemes, while online platforms are also popular. However, the type of product has significant importance. Currently, the most exchanged products are luxury brands or children’s clothes. It is critical to make customers aware of such schemes and where their clothes will end up by participating. Incentives and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) regulations could also increase such practices.

Recycling and Material Reuse

Design has a large role to play in increasing this area. Firstly, it is important to think about recycling from the design stage, because almost a third of all textiles are impossible to recycle from the moment they are made. Furthermore, some elements of the clothes such as zippers and buttons often prevent recycling. Facilitating the removal of such elements and producing labels describing the content of clothes would boost recycling. Once again, EPR schemes, incentives for high recycled content and penalties for products which are hard to recycle, because of their design, should be introduced.

Reference: European Environment Agency. (2022, October). Textiles and the environment: the role of design in Europe’s circular economy. https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/textiles-and-the-environment-the

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