Perspectives of Design for Recycling in Fashion System. Redefining
fashion waste value models
Authors: Ilenia Amato Carmela , Orlacchio Martina 
Published: July 2023

The Fashion industry is facing significant structural and systemic
challenges that require a paradigm shift. According to Agamben, the
resilience of complex systems is the response to the ability to adapt and
evolve through the adoption of innovative and alternative approaches that
are able to transfigure reality by overcoming apparent difficulties. The
notion of intempestivity, in particular, assumes a critical role in building
resilience based on innovation and sustainability. It is defined as a
dynamic form that requires a constant process of reinvention, using apparent
damage as an opportunity to evolve toward substantial improvement.
Calamities, pandemic threats, food crises, destruction of ecosystems and
cultural heritages are just some of the negative phenomena, in many ways
dramatic, with which design, increasingly has to deal from a survival
perspective, returning to "new basic needs," as well as offering solutions
to improve the quality of human life. In Europe, economic growth, closely
dependent on increased production and consumption of resources generates
harmful effects on the environment, eroding biodiversity, and altering
climate stability, health and human well-being. Current production and
consumption models do not follow sustainability criteria, triggering
irreversible phenomena that require urgent intervention strategies. Earth
Overshoot Day signals the date when humanity has used all the biological
resources that the Earth regenerates throughout the year. While dramatic,
the event stirs the consciousness of individuals, about the limits of the
Planet and its depleted resources. An often overlooked but significant
contributor to the environmental emergency is the overproduction of
clothing. According to the World Bank, the Fashion sector is responsible for
10 percent of annual global carbon emissions. Despite approaches in terms of
recycling and reuse, globally 88 percent of recycling refers to polyester
from bottles, with only 12 percent of recycled material coming from
pre-consumer and post-consumer textile waste; moreover, global production of
sustainable materials is growing significantly, although there are still
negative impacts due to resource leakage in processing. The European
framework calls for more efficient management of textile waste, in relation
to the development of circular processes in the relevant industry. The EU
Strategy for Sustainable and Circular Textiles calls for textiles to be free
of harmful substances, durable, recyclable, and made with mandatory minimum
amounts of recycled fibers by 2030; a generic statement that without
specific objectives, results in non-compliant outcomes. The textile and
apparel manufacturing sectors experience damage along the supply chain that
needs a thorough investigation into production processes, shining a
spotlight on the real possibilities of post-consumer recycling, from sorting
to waste management, according to circular economy principles. From the
complex relationship between raw materials, design and production practices
and ecosystems, innovative solutions are determined by considering
fragilities, environmental and social, to restore the balance. The paper
brings together several case studies discussing the effectiveness of
changing sectors through recycling and upcycling processes, circularity of
materials, and reduction through textile waste valorization. Investigating
the dynamics governing the post-consumer waste system, it reveals the
effectiveness of upcycling processes in tracing models and conditions useful
for sustainable transformation. The desired response of the textile/clothing
sector transposes the paradigm shift between sustainable logic and the
design perspective of recycling.