When we were kids, we used to wear clothes until they are no longer wearable or alterable. Then too there were fashion trends to follow but still we did it in a reasonable manner. Now with the riches growing everywhere and fashion trends changing fast, we in the, at least western world, buy wear a few times and throw away! As per some stats it is estimated that we throw away, on an average, 68 garments per year. That is a lot!
So the holy grail of fashion industry is to make it circular, i.e. garments are recycled or put to reuse rather than going to landfill. Becoming circular involves changing the way garments are designed and produced, shipped, bought, used and recycled, with new disruptive technology or new business models. H&M Foundation has challenge to accomplish exactly this goal. So far, for the last few years they were very successful in getting wonderful ideas. Since launch, they received 14000 entries from 182 countries.
Some of the coolest winners from the past years include:
- Polyester eating microbes
- New textile out of citrus juice
- Online marketplace for textile leftovers
- Extracting cellulose from cow manure!
Some great diverse ideas…it is great to see open innovation payoff well. This year’s winners will be announced in April 2019.
Good luck to all the Pieneers!
As always, know of anyone or any startup working on this, please let me know, I will update this post.
[Image Credit: Thanks to JamesDeMers via Pixabay]
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