Responsible production, mindful consumption, sustainable materials and processes, and circularity are some of the broad themes under which 10 innovators have won the Global Change Award for 2025.
- Each winner receives a €200,000 grant and joins the yearlong GCA Changemaker Programme, delivered by H&M Foundation with strategic partners Accenture and KTH Royal Institute of Technology.
- The programme supports winners with innovation coaching, systems thinking tools and leadership development to help bring their ideas closer to real-world impact.
- The group of 10, with the shared mission of decarbonising the textile and fashion industry, has been elected for their bold and pioneering ideas, who, as changemakers, are tackling some of fashion’s most urgent challenges: from reducing emissions and energy use, to enabling circularity and cleaner materials.
- What unites all winners is their potential to contribute to a fashion and textile industry that stays within planetary boundaries while promoting a just transition for people and communities.
THE WINNERS:
1) Youbing Mu, Xiaobo Wan and Shuang Su’s DecoRpet from China has come up with energy-efficient decolouring that enables high-quality recycled PET for the textile industry.
- DecoRpet uses a low-temperature process to remove nearly all dyes and impurities from polyester, delivering 99.9% pure material for high-quality recycling – and cutting energy use by 30%.
What sets it apart:
- Makes textile-to-textile polyester recycling more scalable and energy-efficient
- Enables high-quality recycled PET from mixed-composition fabrics
- Simplifies the recycling process while reducing environmental impact
2) James Parkin & Chris Benson from the United Kingdom have designed Thermal Cyclones — electric heat pumps that replace fossil-fuel steam with energy-efficient heat.
- This innovation replaces outdated gas and oil steam boilers with high-performance heat pumps powered by electricity, reducing energy use by over 75%.
What sets it apart:
- Directly replaces fossil-fuel boilers with minimal infrastructure changes
- Reduces operational energy costs and emissions
- Has potential for broader industrial use, including in food and beverage industries
3) Chloe So and Barna Soma Biro, also from UK, have come up with PULPATRONICS, a chipless, metal-free RFID tags laser-printed on paper for low-impact traceability.
- PulpaTronics offers recyclable, low-cost RFID tags made with carbon-based materials, eliminating metal and microchips while maintaining performance.
What sets it apart:
- Reduces e-waste and environmental impact of traceability tech
- Under current lab-tested conditions, the tags can be recycled up to 7 times and are compatible with current systems
- Enables circularity in logistics with a lower cost and materials footprint
4) UK’s Daisy Harvey has invented Loom, a digital tech-powered platform that connects users with designers to upcycle unworn garments into one-of-a-kind pieces – diverting textile waste and supporting circular fashion.
What sets it apart:
- Creates new value from garments already in circulation
- Supports brands in tackling overstock and returns
- Empowers independent designers and scales the upcycling industry
5) CircularFabrics from Germany by Josephine Mayer, Miguel Chacon-Teran, Ruben Serrano entails high-quality nylon recovery from blended textile waste.
- The NYLOOP technology by CircularFabrics extracts high-quality nylon from blended textile waste without breaking down the fibre, making circular nylon production possible.
What sets it apart:
- Eliminates the need for virgin nylon
- Avoids depolymerisation while preserving fibre performance
- Scalable, portable tech suitable for global manufacturing hubs
6) India’s A Blunt Story by Chandni Batra is all about bio-based soles made from agricultural waste, plant-derived and recycled materials.
- Uncrude is a sole material made from agricultural waste, plant-based ingredients and recycled content, designed to reduce reliance on fossil-based plastics in footwear soles.
What sets it apart:
- Reduces microplastics and dependency on crude oil
- Supports clean chemistry and farmer livelihoods
- Integrates into existing footwear production systems
7) UK’s Mohammad Redwanur Rahman’s Brilliant Dyes is all about natural dyes from algae, made with low-energy extraction.
Brilliant Dyes harnesses phycocyanin from cyanobacteria to produce biodegradable, non-toxic dyes through a low-energy process that supports a cleaner colour supply chain.
What sets it apart:
- Offers a scalable, cost-effective alternative to synthetic dyes
- Potential to halve the footprint of indigo dyeing
- Creates secondary benefits like fertilizer and animal feed from by-products
8) Mohammad Abbas Uddin from Bangladesh has Decarbonization Lab, an R&D hub pioneering low-emission dyeing, finishing and textile treatment.
- This lab bridges academia and industry to develop and test low-emission processes in dyeing and finishing – offering factories and workers practical tools to modernise production.
What sets it apart:
- Empowers factories to adopt lower-impact processes confidently
- Promotes collaboration between academia, workers, and producers
- Provides a model for replicable decarbonisation in global dyehouses
9) Jade A Bouledjouidja’s Renasens provides waterless recycling of blended textile waste into high-quality raw materials.
- Sweden-based Renasens has created a waterless process with no harmful chemicals to recycle blended textiles without depolymerisation, maintaining fibre integrity and reducing microplastic pollution.
What sets it apart:
- Bridges the gap between mechanical and chemical recycling
- Turns textile waste into high-quality materials without avoiding hazardous chemicals.
- Reduces reliance on virgin fibre while preserving performance
10) Ghana’s Yayra Agbofah’s Revival Circularity Lab ensures upcycling of textile waste through community-led design in the Kantamanto Market.
- This creative hub transforms unsellable garments into new products through repair, design and local artisan training, extending textile lifespans while supporting community livelihoods.
What sets it apart:
- Builds circularity from the ground up through community ownership
- Combines innovation, education, and employment
- Prototypes reuse at scale for everything from apparel to construction materials
WHAT THEY SAID
This year’s winners are not just solving problems; they’re rethinking the systems behind them. Their ideas reflect the kind of early-stage innovation we need to unlock system-level change, and remind us that transformation starts with brave, often uncertain steps.
— Annie Lindmark
Programme Director
H&M Foundation
