Business case

Reduced green house gas emissions released into the biosphere

Reduce Emissions (SDG13)

Reduced use of virgin materials and/or an increase of the use of secondary and bio-based materials

Reduce Material Consumption (SDG12)

Minimise waste through diversion: Instead of sending waste to landfill, it is redirected into other industrial processes for handling, treatment, recycling, recovery, or reuse in various forms. 

Minimise waste through design: At the outset of a process of project, plan and design such that there is zero waste or minimal waste during production, use, and at end of life. 

Minimise Waste (SDG12)

Reduced use and withdrawal of water and rate of recycling and reuse of water

Save Water (SDG6)

Producing and providing business and consumer goods and services

Goods and Services

Producing textile and leather products and processing them into apparel and accessories

Fashion and Textiles

Ensure renewable, reusable, non-toxic resources are utilised as materials and energy in an efficient way

Prioritise regenerative resources

While resources are in-use, maintain, repair and upgrade them to maximise their lifetime and give them a second life through take back strategies when applicable

Stretch the lifetime

Utilise waste streams as a source of secondary resources and recover waste for reuse and recycling

Use waste as a resource

Utilise bio-based, reusable, non-toxic and non-critical materials

Regenerative materials

Give products and parts another life after their end-of-use

Maximise lifetime of products after use

Reuse, repurpose, and recycle waste streams within the same industry

Valorise waste streams - closed loop

Enacting measures that optimise material use such as 3D printing, etc.

Material efficiency

Using materials that can be easily reused or recycled after use

Reusable, recyclable materials and inputs

Activities to clean, decorate, and restore products back to working condition for original or new purposes

Refurbishment, remanufacturing, renovation

Using waste materials that have been processed and recycled to produce new products within the same industry

Using closed loop recycled materials

Prioritise regenerative resources [Textiles]

Regenerative materials [Textiles]

Material efficiency [Textiles]

Slow strategies aim to keep materials in use for as long as possible, for example through design for durability and repairability. A more circular economy is also a slower one: materials, components, and products—and even buildings and infrastructure—that we lock in stocks are made to last. This will lower material demand in the long run, in essence also serving to narrow resource flows.

Slow

Regenerate strategies phase out hazardous or toxic materials and processes and substitute them with regenerative biomass resources. A circular economy aims to mimic natural cycles—by shifting to more regenerative farming practices, for example—while also maximising the share of circular biomass that enters the economy. Regeneration can happen both at the systems level (by designing regenerative processes) as well as at the product level (by switching synthetic to organic fertilisers, for example).

Regenerate

Cycle strategies aim to cycle and reuse materials at their highest value: they maximise the volume of secondary materials re-entering the economy, ultimately minimising the need for virgin material inputs and therefore also narrowing flows. Of course, virgin materials will always be needed to a degree: all materials degrade and can’t be cycled infinitely, use energy, and require blending with virgin materials to maintain strength and functionality.

Cycle

Impacts

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Industries

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The principles of a circular economy concern designing out waste, regenerating ecosystems and keeping items in use. Decoupling the economy from material flows—improving the rate of resource productivity faster than the economic growth rate—is also a consistent guide. By evolving with the growing number of applications of circular economy principles, and consolidating these strategies across thematic areas, Circle Economy’s Key Elements Framework (KE) renders the elements of the circular economy salient and serves as a basis to derive contextual strategies and interventions. 


The Framework consists of:
- Core Elements: Activities directly handling product or material flows; and uniquely,
- Enabling Elements: those that remove obstacles for core actors.


Key elements of the circular economy

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Circle Economy's framework of strategies and activities that define the circular economy

The Textiles Key Elements Framework is based on the main Key Elements Framework which renders the elements of the circular economy salient and serves as a basis to derive textile-focused strategies and interventions. 

The framework is action-based to provide users with concrete inspiring exemples to prevent and reduce the textiles waste mountain. 

The Framework consists of:
- 3 core elements: activities directly handling textile product or material flows; and uniquely,
- 4 Enabling Elements: those that remove obstacles for core actors.

Under which strategies provide further detail. Finally, each strategy consists of a diversity of tangible solutions which are framed in relation to the sought outcome. 

'Click through each of the seven elements cards below to explore the framework and circular textile-focused case studies in more depth!'

This framework was developed in collaboration with Circle Economy's textiles team. Read more about it [here]( https://www.circle-economy.com/programmes/textiles). 

Textiles Key Elements Framework

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 An action-based framework for apparel brands working towards circular strategies

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Based on the work of [Bocken et al. (2016)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/309699661_Product_design_and_business_model_strategies_for_a_circular_economy), the Four Flows Framework serves as a simple framework for managing resource flows in a circular economy by using less (Narrow), using for longer (Slow), using again (Cycle), and using clean, regenerative materials and energy (Regenerate).

These different principles of circular economy can be applied to our socioeconomic metabolism: we can design stocks like buildings, infrastructure, machinery, and vehicles to be rich resource mines for the future, and design manufactured goods and consumables to be cycled and made regenerative. Furthermore, the focus must also centre on getting more value out of fewer materials. Achieving the aims of a circular economy—minimising material use, regenerating the Earth, and preventing material losses—can be done through these four key strategies mentioned above.

Source: Circle Economy. (2023). *[The circularity gap report 2023](https://www.circularity-gap.world/2023)* (p.22). Amsterdam: Circle Economy. 

Four Flows Framework

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            Iinouiio is a textile recycling business with over 200 years of UK heritage in shoddy textile recycling, producing recycled fibres, spun yarns and knitted accessories.
Iinouiio is looking to rejuvenate and develop British wool textile recycling to create new yarns for the global market, developing a service to reshoring of sustainable textile recycling practises that will enable UK brands to embed circular practices and commercial sustainability into their work.
R&D Focus:
We aim to convert high-value fibre from weaving and knitting waste suitable for re-spinning, creating new yarns for knitting and woven fabric. In turn, an outcome of this work will form the basis of an R&D service.
The project will launch in autumn 2021.
Partners:

UAL: University of the Arts London
London College of Fashion, UAL
            A highly skilled weaver, Alice’s career spans textile design, manufacture, R&D and consultancy working with yarn, trend, fashion and interior industries and education. Since completing her masters at the Royal College of Art (RCA), Alice has founded an award-winning textile practise collaborating with international clients and European mills. Her passion for craft inspires her to develop commercial woven and non-woven fabrics through a process of handiwork that doesn’t get lost in the stages of industrial manufacture. Extensive experience working with the textile supply chain has led Alice onto sustainable research projects, eliminating pre-consumer textile waste and developing it into fabrics suitable for market.
 More        John Parkinson has worked in textile recycling since 1977. In 1990, he launched ‘Evergreen’ (the first UK business of its kind) to produce fibres, yarns and fabrics using responsible materials and production methods. Despite the decline of the UK woollen industry, in 2019 John co-founded Iinouiio (acronym: ‘it is never over until it is over’) to re-energise the ‘endangered’ craft of traditional UK textile recycling.
 More        Veronika is a Reader in Material Technology and Design at LCF where she is developing novel biomimetic approaches to design and innovation of Active Material Systems within the textile industry that intersect biology, material engineering and textile design. Veronika is an LCF graduate who was awarded a PhD scholarship to study engineering design at Bath University. Her practice intersects academic and manufacturing sectors both within her role as Reader and as co-director of MMT Textiles Limited and inventor of INOTEK TM (an award winning biomimetic textile platform that draws on ambient moisture to trigger reversible mechanical changes in the fabric structure, typically for advanced moisture and insulation management). Veronika is also a bestselling author in industrial design and consults extensively with private and public organisations in material science, textile technology, functional apparel and fashiontech. 
 More        Kate is Professor of Circular Design and Innovation and Co-Director of the Centre for Circular Design at UAL, a world-leading research centre using practice research to innovate, steer and support circular economies and communities around the globe. Kate’s design research operates at the intersection of materials science with design and sustainability principles. As industry and Governments raise the priority of sustainable business, Kate has undertaken a range of industrial consultancy projects for fashion and textiles organisations including Worn Again Technologies Ltd, Filippa K, VF Corporation and the Ellen MacArthur Foundation. Core skills and competences include:

Laser finishing for fashion and textiles
Circular economy and circular design research
Sustainable business consultancy in the fashion sector
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Huddersfield

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iinouiio is an acronym for It Is Never Over Until It Is Over, and is pronounced ‘in-oo-e-o’. The company was founded by John Parkinson who has a rich history in the Shoddy and Mungo industry and uses his knowledge to educate the industry on recycled textiles. 

iinouiio

<p>iinouiio (pronounced ‘in-oo-e-o’) specialise in converting post-consumer wool and cashmere waste into useable fibres, yarns and fabrics in the UK. They promote responsible textile materials and production methods by using discarded textiles. In 2022, they began working with Camira Yarns in Huddersfield, Yorkshire on their first wool and luxury fibre recycling line.</p>