In the fashion world every season new trends and new terms appear, but we are not always able to understand the meaning and why of each one of them.
So today we are going to talk about two “hot” terms in a way that you learn and that you can have ideas on how to update your business.
Sustainable clothing and accessories provide a new market for job opportunities, money flow in the economy and moderation in the use of original raw materials.
With the trend of sustainability, recycled clothing is increasingly in fashion and maintains the principle of three erres:
• Reduce;
• Reuse;
• Recycle
As well as the sustainability tripod: economy, ecology and social equity.
UPCYCLING
The simplified translation of the term upcycling is reuse.
Upcycling can be used in any part of the product’s creative process, whether it is reusing textual waste, defective parts, or even collections that have not been sold …
The idea is to literally reuse / reuse and give a new function to a product that would be discarded.
You can imagine upcycling as a new (and more current) customization format. While customization gave new life to an old part, upcycling makes that old part have a new use.
Through this process the part can have a much longer life cycle, and this generates less waste for the planet, a very important issue for any brand / store.
Upcycling goes hand-in-hand with other trendy sustainability movements, such as eco fashion and slow fashion, so you need to understand these movements and start to imagine if any of them can be put into practice in your brand / store.
Major brands such as Comme des Garçon and Stella McCartney have already used the technique in their collections.
In economically uncertain times, upcycling can be an excellent way to compose the mix of products of your brand / store.
Even if today you are finding this practice very distant from your business, it is good that you start to think about how you could use this process in the production or commercialization of reused products.
You can search for brands in your segment that already use upcycling and thus have inspirations, and then look around and ask, how can I transform this piece or this residue ???
Sometimes you can make a collab with an artist from your region, you can also partner with a seamstress or have items in your store that can transform the piece that the customer just bought !!!!
Example of pieces that went through the Recycling process and started to have a new utility:
Images – Pinterest
RECYCLING
Recycling, which is nothing more than the already known Recycling, is the process that allows the recovered waste to be transformed again into raw material, which can be used in the production of the same product that generated it.
In short, it is the reuse of the same material for the same purpose. A good example would be the customization or the manufacture of new parts from old parts.
The recycling process ends up becoming more in the hands of the clothing industries, for store owners this process has several limitations.
The shopkeeper can “bring” this concept to his business by looking for brands and products that use this process, and even though indirectly he can be part of the sustainable chain.
Within the Recycling process, we also have Downcycling, or cascade, is the recycling of waste in which the recycled material is of lesser quality and functionality than the original material.
