Swedish clothing company H&M has launched a new denim collection for which the company focused on saving water in all phases, working with suppliers who use recycling water systems.
Recently, Sports company Puma is about to pilot an innovative production process to use existing football jerseys to produce new ones to reduce waste and pave the way toward more circular production models.
The RE: JERSEY project by Puma takes football kits as the ingredient to create yarn for new jerseys, which means old garments that feature logos, embroideries, and club badges, which previously hindered recycling efforts to turn old garments into new ones, can now be used.
According to Puma, in the recycling process, the garments are chemically broken down into their main components, colors are filtered out and the material is chemically put back together to create a yarn, that has the same performance characteristics as virgin polyester.
As for the H&M collection, it is inspired by late 1990s and early Y2K vibes and features low-waist flares, high-waist straight-leg jeans, skinny jeans, dungarees, a top with a tie-up back, mini-skirts, and denim shirts.
Besides that, the denim washes in the collection have been given a low-impact Environmental Impact Measurement (EIM) Score by Jeanologia, and feature water-saving dyeing technologies.
Also, laser technology was used for the printed styles to substitute traditional chemical-intensive printing processes.
To further minimize water usage, H&M worked with suppliers who used recycling water systems during the washing stage.
