upcycling
concerned about the long-term impact
second largest polluting industry in the world, contributing
of textiles on our world. And so the
1.2 billion tonnes of carbon a year.
husband and wife team decided to
Globally, 87 per cent of all disposed textiles are sent to
shift from making clothes to playing a
landfill or are incinerated; 12 per cent is mechanically recycled
lead role in upcycling and shaping the
by cutting it or shredding it into fibre, insulation material or
circular economy through its circular
rags, and less than one per cent is chemically recycled back
fashion model.
to reusable raw materials. The effects that textiles have on the
“When we started to look at our impact on textile landfill it immediately made us turn to researching the
planet prove that the linear economy model of take, make and dispose is completely unsustainable. Recently rebranding from Manrags to Upparel, Elias
impacts that the entire fashion industry
iterates that it’s about the brand evolving into much more
had so far made and the figures were
than just changing the company from a sock and underwear
devastating. I have always been
subscription model to a circular fashion model.
conscious of my footprint on the planet.
“Rebranding the company was a very long process so
Being a mother and thinking about my
when it finally happened the feeling was euphoric. Evolving
children’s future we knew it was time to
as a company with a brand name that was holding us back in
step up and make a change for future
many ways, it’s incredible how far we got with Manrags, but
generations to ensure they can enjoy our earth the same way we have.” The average Aussie purchases 27kg of textiles each year and disposes of 23kg each year. This means that as a country, we’re discarding over 6,000kg of textile and clothing waste every 10 minutes. Did you know that clothing waste takes up to 40 years to decompose, whilst shoes can take 1,000 years to break down? All up, the fashion industry is the November 2020 27
Giftguide magazine is an award-winning bi-annual publication that is regarded by retailers as the ‘Bible’ of the gift and homewares industry...
Published on Nov 6, 2020
Giftguide magazine is an award-winning bi-annual publication that is regarded by retailers as the ‘Bible’ of the gift and homewares industry...