Sustainability Issues

What is Circular Fashion?

Circular is rapidly becoming a buzzword in the industry. We provide a quick guide to what it is...and isn’t.
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Key Takeaways
  • Use mono materials where possible and ensure that products made from multiple materials can be easily disassembled to aid product recyclability.
  • Assess what substances and materials of concern are used in production that cause pollution and/or prevent recycling then work with suppliers to remove them.
  • Consider how other waste in the supply chain from garment off cuts to packaging can be captured then reused or recycled through internal processes or working with partner organisations.
  • Keep garments in use and reuse as long as possible through developing or participating in collection schemes and supporting the development of technologies to recycle used textiles back to ‘good as new’ raw materials.

For a term that only emerged in 2014 ‘circular’ has rapidly become one of fashion’s most embraced sustainability concepts. 

90 fashion brands and retailers from Nike to adidas, Ganni to Reformation, Lacoste to VF Corporation are all signatories to the Global Fashion Agenda’s 2020 Circular Fashion System Commitment. And with interest in the term 'circular fashion' doubling over the period 2014-19 according to Google Trends what does this mean for the fashion industry?

What is circular fashion?

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30 October 2019
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Author
Clare Lissaman

Head of Oxfam Advisory Services at Oxfam and 2 others