Circular Economy and Fashion: a New Cotton Project white paper

Circular Economy as a concept is a recent addition to the production-consumption system currently at place. This white paper was written as the first of a series of working publications focused on the proposal, implementation and acquired knowledge gathered during the development of the New Cotton Project: an European Union funded project which is part of the Horizon 2020 programme to incentivise circular solutions throughout the industry. This first publication highlights the main strategies, stakeholders, and difficulties in the creation of a circular ecosystem proposed around an innovative technology which produces new cellulosic fibres from textile waste, disrupting the textile industry’s unsustainable linear economy. This white paper will introduce the reader to the theory on circular economy, provide examples and peculiarities of circular textile practices and finally present the New Cotton Project and its collaboration to the body of knowledge within this field.