Specials

There is an urgent imperative to shift towards a circular economy in which waste and pollution are removed from the system, more so after the pandemic. Here are four examples of clothing businesses that made use of the lockdown to put this ideal into practice.

Throughout his career, Japanese fashion designer Issey Miyake, who has died of cancer at 84, rejected terms like “fashion”. But his work allowed much of the world to reimagine itself through clothing.

BD Nathani, who always dreamt of travelling the world began by selling a cough syrup, and ironically was felled by the dastardly COVID-19. He had recapitualted his journey in his debut book My Journey Through Lala Land.  A texfash.com tribute through extracts from Chapter 7 of the book.

The mission of the Sustainable Leather Foundation (SLF) is to support the global leather industry to learn, to improve and to protect the planet for future generations. Towards this objective its latest offering is the Partner Profiles and QR Codes which link up the SLF and a company’s website, and the company’s Transparency Dashboard. In a brief conversation with texfash.com, Deborah Taylor, Managing Director at SLF elaborates on the initiatives.

Vegan, completely biodegradable and produced with bio-fabrication, AMSilk’s products are environment friendly and make a significant contribution to a future zero-waste society. Ulrich Scherbel, Managing Director at AMSilk, the world’s leading supplier of innovative high-performance biotech materials, talks to texfash.com about how he aims to make smart performing biotech materials part of everyday life.

An entrepreneur-driven industry, the apparel kidswear sector in India is forecast to grow at 14.5% CAGR during 2021–26. And making a play for it is a 100% boot-strapped mobile app-based B2B aggregator platform—KidCity—as it onboards retailers, manufacturers and some other critical cogs in this ecosystem. Could it emerge as a catalyst to change the status quo of the last five decades or more? Tech-enabled, will it work like a magic wand to resolve the inherent structural problems? texfash.com explores.

From pre-pandemic exports a little under 2% of its total revenues to gunning for a 15-20% growth this fiscal, the Ahmedabad-based Chiripal Group, is on an expansion drive as it looks to augment its overall denim capacity to 240 MMPA.

BeBop Sensors is a leader in smart fabric sensor technologies. Based in Berkeley, California (US), BeBop Sensors last month launched a new RoboSkin line of skin-like coverings for tactile awareness for humanoid robots and prosthetics. RoboSkin fits all robotic body parts: limbs, fingers, feet, head, and torso, to make robots “feel” better. Founder Keith McMillen speaks about trends in the sector.

The Ethiopian government and the investors creating employment have a long way to go to offer women what the International Labour Organisation terms decent work. A recent research shows that the main actors determining labour conditions in Ethiopian factories have little concern for the potential damage that poor working conditions can have on their reputations.

Zipper major YKK is conducting lifecycle assessment of all its products to help guide development of sustainable trims, even as the fashion element is changing for this fashion accessory with consumer-led demands.