Unlocking the potential of post-consumer textile waste: experimenting with new recycling practices

The textile sector represents one of the most important industrial supply chains in Italian manufacturing and, at the same time, is characterized by a significant ecological footprint. In particular, end-of-life management of products is a significant challenge, both because of the textile composition composed of mixtures of synthetic and natural fibers - which hinders recycling operations - and because of the increasing volumes of material given the dynamics of fast-fashion and changing production patterns. Currently, only 1 percent of textiles produced globally are reused, and the percentage of waste is expected to grow. The increasing visibility of the problem has brought about a change in the perception of the fate of waste. The concept of waste, today, has taken on a positive connotation, being viewed no longer just as an inert object to be discarded, but as a resource. Given the paradigm shift that sees waste as a new resource, it is crucial to outline a design framework that paves the way for a significant change of productive, economic, environmental, and cultural scope in the use of material resources. This approach becomes crucial to turn waste abundance into a design opportunity. The purpose of the research is to explore the potential applications of post-consumer textile waste, focusing mainly on textiles with mixed fiber composition and those whose material is difficult to identify due to the lack of labels, thus preventing the recycling process. The objective is to study, test and define a new process of producing neomaterials from post-consumer textile waste in mixed fibers and, from their qualitative and quantitative properties, define the most suitable application. The research is supported by the main case study, Insieme Cooperativa Sociale of Vicenza. This entity (ex. L.381/91) is a non-profit organization (Onlus) that involves more than one hundred workers in a single project: giving a second chance to people and things that do not have one. The research is structured into a desk research part and an applied research part. The former focuses on the analysis of the textile sector in the age of circularity, post-consumer waste management, and analysis of the relevant regulatory and economic framework. Important is the mapping of national and international case studies, which include all those entities operating in the textile waste and scrap recycling sector. The second phase focuses on the definition and application of the experimental methodology, and is structured into the following phases: waste selection and sampling; material preparation and fraying; testing of material specimens; validation of the process; and analysis of qualitative and quantitative properties on the samples obtained. The added value of the research will be precisely the promotion of new recovery actions that are struggling to emerge today, demonstrating the potentials of textile waste metamorphoses, intrinsic peculiarities, and otherwise little exploited properties. The research results can be used to devise targeted strategies to promote the application and dissemination of the developed process along with the related results obtained. This effort can help promote and increase the adoption of circular design and ecological transition principles within the area's manufacturing companies.