This October, The North Face (TNF) have introduced their first-ever circular collection in an attempt to reduce the amount of waste produced in making clothing.
87% of material used to make clothing ends up as waste. In fact, every second, the equivalent of one garbage truck of textiles is landfilled or burned. Not only does this fill up our planet with an excess of rubbish – and encourage us to produce virgin materials – but the chemicals released in the burning also pollute our atmosphere and exacerbate climate change.
Related: Beyond Leave No Trace
This collection, however, is designed to prevent waste and pollution, and to regenerate existing products and materials.
In short, they’ve basically constructed each design in their collection to minimise waste in the manufacturing process, to utilise recycled fabrics, and to make sure it can be easily disassembled and recycled at the end of its lifespan. In this way, they’re using a circular system to ensure that what they put out into the world comes back to them, and can therefore be repurposed over and over again.
To help with this they now also provide a solution for customers to recycle their used apparel and footwear. The ‘Clothes The Loop’ program enables consumers to recycle unwanted apparel, footwear and equipment in any condition from The North Face simply by dropping it off in store.