Recycled Cotton

Recycled cotton in our collection comes in the form of denim, canvas, fleece, Circulose jersey, and recycled cotton rib jersey. Our recycled cotton fabrics are more textured and have natural unevenness than virgin cotton. You might see some color variation and slubs in the fabrics. Recycled cotton is normally made from pre-consumer textiles such as cotton scraps, factory offcuts, or deadstock from virgin cotton fabric production. Post-consumer textiles such as used jeans and t-shirts are also used. All the materials are sorted by colour and composition, shredded, and spun into a new yarn. It is a labor-intensive and expensive process, which is why today only less than 1% of clothing ends up being recycled into new material. Textiles that cannot be recycled are downcycled for insulation or incinerated to use for fuels. Recycled cotton is often paired with virgin cotton to improve the quality of the finished fabric, as the recycled yarns are often more fragile.

We have fabrics with up to 60% recycled cotton, which is as high as most places can go to keep the quality in mechanical recycling processes. When using post-consumer clothing, the recycled cotton content can usually go up to 30%. Circulose is a viscose fiber made of cotton textile waste, with 30% coming from pulp made of waste from cotton production and 70% wood cellulose. The pulp is made of cotton production waste like denim scraps and garment waste. Recycled cotton is the most expensive kind of cotton fabric available. Recycling can be an expensive and inaccessible activity because of the quantities required to make it worthwhile. We are trying to slowly transition into having more recycled fibers in our collection, starting with small quantities and increasing as the industry’s processes develop and prices go down.