Looptworks

Scott Hamlin, Founder and CEO of Looptworks (and University of Oregon graduate) joined the SPM 610: Sustainability in Sports Products class last Thursday to share an incredible story of textile circularity. Scott was inspired to pursue circular solutions early in his career to address the waste created through textile production. This journey included founding Looptworks in 2009, creating consumer products only from excess materials, to recently building one of the first facilities in the US that transforms excess and post-consumer textiles into new fibers. Scott, Looptworks, and the Loopt Foundation are accelerating the circular revolution. The UO Sports Product Management Master’s Program looks forward to touring the new Looptworks facility in Portland this Spring.

BREAKING: California Introduces Sweeping Fashion Accountability Bill to Cut Emissions and Regulate Chemical Use California has introduced?AB 405, the Fashion Environmental Accountability Act, a bill that would hold major fashion brands accountable for their environmental impact. If passed, companies with over?$100M in global revenue?must?disclose and reduce emissions, manage toxic chemicals, and conduct wastewater testing—or face financial penalties. “Textile waste is the fastest-growing waste in our nation’s landfills, driven by the rise of disposable ‘Trash Fashion,’” said?Assemblymember Dawn Addis, the bill’s sponsor. “We’re facing a climate crisis, and the Fashion Act is common-sense legislation to hold the industry accountable, reduce emissions, and tackle waste.” We’ll break it all down in this week's?Week/End Sustainable Fashion News recap. Make sure you’re subscribed to get the?need-to-know sustainable fashion updates—delivered straight to your inbox in one single email, every week/end. ??https://lnkd.in/gXrsqnmM

Walk the talk this year! EcoAthlete Champions Phoebe Anderson, Tina Muir, and Seyi Smith share 5 simple practices to reduce the environmental impacts of your shoes. Learn how to transform your footwear into a force for good. #clothes4good, #climatecomeback

Big news! ?? The US Government Accountability Office (GAO)?just released its first-ever report on textile waste, fast fashion's negative impact, and recycling challenges—representing the first federal acknowledgment of textile waste as a significant issue in the U.S. The report reveals a 50% increase in U.S. textile waste from 2000 to 2018, citing fast fashion and inadequate recycling infrastructure as key contributors. GAO recommends the creation of an interagency mechanism to coordinate federal efforts, involving the EPA, NIST, and the Departments of State and Energy, and advises Congress to consider a national textile waste management strategy. Want the full scoop? Don’t miss tomorrow's?Week/End?recap, where we break down the need-to-know sustainability news across fashion, business, and ethics—all in ONE email. Not subscribed yet? This link is for you! ?? ?? ?? https://lnkd.in/gXrsqnmM

What did we learn from our collaborative pilot with FastFeetGrinded? Footwear is traditionally made using a vast array of different materials, resulting in design complexity that makes it difficult to recover materials in a technically and economically feasible manner. In addition, the lack of widespread footwear recycling solutions and infrastructure hinders the recovery of footwear products. Therefore, collaborative and innovative efforts are needed to enhance footwear circularity. To tackle this challenge, Fashion for Good launched a collaborative pilot with partners adidas, Inditex, Target and Zalando, in collaboration with innovator FastFeetGrinded, aimed at testing and validating the footwear recycling process and supporting the uptake of recycled materials in footwear. The brands closely evaluated the outputs of FastFeetGrinded’s process for quality and purity, aiming to showcase the potential of FastFeetGrinded’s footwear recycling technology and pave the way for scalable solutions. Some of our reflections and findings from the project were:? ? Open-loop recycling is achievable using purely mechanical recycling, however, for closed-loop recycling further technology advancements are necessary to achieve higher purity outputs.? ? Sequencing of multiple technologies along the footwear waste supply chain, from waste aggregation through recycling will help overcome some of the performance challenges.? ? Impact assessments for footwear recycling are challenging due to limited base case data availability in the industry. As such, complexities arise with evaluating emerging recycling technologies through a comparative LCA.? ? Sustainable innovation in footwear is fairly nascent compared to apparel and there is a lot of work to be done. We have an opportunity to leverage our learnings from the apparel space to build an ecosystem that takes into account the interdependencies and nuances at each stage of the production process. Collaborative action is the key to unlocking this approach which is why Fashion for Good is working closely with all stakeholders on this topic. Watch this space as we head into 2025! Click here to read our reflections: https://lnkd.in/ekMAvVFv Project Lead: Jyotsna Gopinath Sophie van Kol #Sustainability #Innovation #FashionForGood #circularity #futuretech

One of the projects that I'm most proud of from my time working at Nau was initiating a partnership with local Portland textile?recyclers Looptworks, to upcycle old Nau garments (which had been in storage for 5-10 years ??) into new accessories (which the brand's collections were lacking.) These bags were *in production* when Nau closed down U.S.?business operations in?February, and I am still disappointed that I wasn't able to guide this project all the?way through... but—I just saw that they are now being sold in S. Korea! (That's where Nau is now based. Screenshots from the Nau Korea website.)?I hope it's a success and starts an upcycling trend there. Nau's was one of the last upcycling projects that Looptworks took on before moving into their brand-new textile recycling facility in Gresham, where they will be focusing more on fiber to fiber recycling and circularity! It's very exciting business. Working in the apparel?industry is a wild time. Clothing production?and waste are at an all-time high; we don't need more new clothes from virgin resources. Period. We DO need to support the development of textile recycling and circular supply chains. It's an action we can take immediately to significantly reduce the industry's impact on the environment. If you're reading this and work with a brand on the west coast: give Looptworks a call and start talking seriously about creating your circular material loop *now*! And, for creative upcycling partnerships, look to the icons at Portland Garment Factory who just released a similar garment upcycle collab with Cotopaxi. ?