RECYCLING & DISPOSSAL

What Is Textile Recycling?

Textile recycling is the process by which old clothing and other textiles are recovered for reuse or material recovery. The necessary steps in the textile recycling process involve the donation, collection, sorting and processing of textiles, and then subsequent transportation to end-users of used garments, rags or other recovered materials. 

The growing textile recycling industry has evolved into a nearly $1 trillion industry globally, comprising clothing, as well as furniture and mattress material, linens, draperies, cleaning materials, leisure equipment, and many other items. 

The Urgency to Recycle Textiles

The importance of recycling textiles is increasingly being recognized. An estimated 100 billion garments are produced annually, worldwide. The recycling rate for textiles derived from clothing and footwear was 13.0%, while the recovery for sheets and pillowcases was 15.8% for the same year. As such, textile recycling is a significant challenge to be addressed as we strive to move closer to a zero-landfill society.

Once in landfills, natural fibres can take a few weeks to a few years to decompose. Additionally, synthetic textiles are designed not to decompose. In the landfill, they may release toxic substances into groundwater and surrounding soil.

Textile recycling offers the following environmental benefits:

  • Decreases landfill space requirements, bearing in mind that synthetic fiber products do not decompose and that natural fibers may release greenhouse gasses
  • Avoided use of virgin fibers
  • Reduced consumption of energy and water
  • Pollution avoidance
  • Less demand for dyes
The Recycling Process 

For the basics of recycling, read my article, How Clothing Recycling Works. For textiles to be recycled, there are fundamental differences between natural and synthetic fibers. For natural textiles:

  • The incoming unwearable material is sorted by type of material and color. Color sorting results in a fabric that does not need to be re-dyed. The color sorting means no re-dying is required, saving energy and avoiding pollutants.
  • Textiles are then pulled into fibers or shredded, sometimes introducing other fibers into the yarn. Materials are shredded or pulled into fibers. Depending on the end use of the yarn, other fibers may be incorporated.
  • The yarn is then cleaned and mixed through a carding process.
  • Then the yarn is re-spun and ready for subsequent use in weaving or knitting.
  • Some fibers are not spun into yards, however. Some are compressed for textile filling such as in mattresses.

In the case of polyester-based textiles, garments are shredded and then granulated for processing into polyester chips. These are subsequently melted and used to create new fibres for use in new polyester fabrics.

Garment Production & Delivery

Garment production is an organized activity consisting of sequential processes such as laying, marking, cutting, stitching, checking, finishing, pressing and packaging.

1. GARMENT PRODUCTION
Garment production consists of multiple steps. Leading fast-fashion brands have the resources to produce hundreds and thousands of items of clothing within a few weeks once designs have been approved. For smaller brands, producing garments takes a little bit longer.

Here’s a step-by step guide to garment production:
A. PRE-PRODUCTION
Pre-production consists of concept and design, made to measure, fabric and trim sourcing, pattern making, sampling, and fitting.
• CONCEPT AND DESIGN
Our team will discuss ideas with and advise on fabrications and suitable printing methods to develop the technical drawings and tech packs that will bring your ideas onto paper and to life. The technical packages include illustrations and specification sheets.

• MADE TO MEASURE
In an environment where items are custom made to an individual’s unique style and measurements, it’s important to provide the perfect fit garment in a timely fashion. CLO3D and Gerber’s AccuMark® Made-to-Measure (MTM) system helps us manufacture custom-fitted garments.

• FABRIC AND TRIM SOURCING
After the designs have been finalized, our team will help source the fabric needed to bring them to life. Our team can provide a list of our in-house fabrics and materials or suggest our trusted textile suppliers that can sell a variety of products.
• PATTERN MAKING
Our skillful pattern makers offer both paper flat patterns and digital patterns using software to draw and represent your designs. In addition to creating the pattern, we can also help with the digitization of your existing hard copies as well as the revision and grading of the patterns according to measurement tables.
• SAMPLING
Samples are the prototype of a creation.  They are sewn individually and used to test the garment in case any pattern adjustments are necessary.

B. PRODUCTION PLANNING
The production planner in the garment factory will schedule all activities in advance. The planning team will ensure that all activities are completed on time. As the batch is being produced, the team will fill out the details on a time and action calendar.
• CUTTING PROCESS
Fabric is by far the most expensive item when it comes to garment manufacturing. Garment manufacturers have the responsibility to make sure that the purchased fabric is being utilized fully. The pattern makers and the cutters on the floor have to ensure that there is minimum wastage when cutting fabric.

Our vision is to use laser-cutting for greater efficiency and to prevent wastage.

• MANUFACTURING AND QUALITY CONTROL
The amount of time needed to manufacture the items in your line will depend on the complexity of the designs; the more complicated the design, the longer it will take to manufacture.

We will carry out quality checks during the manufacturing process and report to our internal fashion house. Quality checks are needed to catch and fix errors in a timely manner.

Once production is completed, your company will be given time to review the pieces and check for quality. You have the right to reject items and send them back to the factory if they don’t meet your standards and request replacements.

2. DELIVERY
After the items have been reviewed by the client, the rest of the order will be delivered to warehouses or individuals.

Product Processing

The process outlined below is the tried and trusted way to create the fibres necessary for hemp clothing. The result is an extremely strong fabric that’s durable enough to last many years. Let us dig into the next session of our Fibre to Fashion Series.

RETTING

This process involves using moisture and microbes to break down the pectin (chemical bonds) that hold the hemp stem together. This leads to easier separation of the bast from the woody core, called the shiv or hurd. While some manufacturers perform retting via the direct use of enzymes, most follow one of these three methods:

  • Water Retting: This includes soaking the stems in a water source such as a pond, stream, or special water tank. Water retting can take up to 10 days. It works best when you use warm water filled with bacteria.
  • Field Retting: The farmer leaves the hemp on the ground to decompose naturally. This process can take 4 – 6 weeks and requires close monitoring.
  • Winter Retting: Conditions of temperature and moisture usually are most favorable early in the fall. As winter sets in, low temperature limits bacterial activity even though adequate moisture is present. Hemp can winter up to 4 months without suffering serious damage, but often it will be over-retted. Alternate freezing and thawing spells gives best results in winter field-retting.

Currently, there is no industry standards in retting hemp for textile clothing. However our preferred method is winter retting due to the favourable conditions here in Alberta, Canada.

After finishing the retting step, the farmer dries the stalk to the point where the moisture content is below 15%. Then they bail the stalk and get it ready for the next part of the process.

FIBRE PROCESSING

This step involves passing the stalks through fluted rollers. They crush and break the hurd into small pieces and separate some of the fibre called decortication. This machine enables workers to keep the leaves on the stalks during the breaking process.

Scutching – The next step involves beating the broken stems. By ‘scutching’ them in this manner, you separate the fibers you want from the hemp plant’s woody core.

Hackling -This is the term for combing the stems to get rid of any unwanted particles. It also ensures the fibres are further aligned into a long sliver. The short fibres produced during separation are called tow. The long fibres are called line, and a single strand can reach over five meters long.

YARN PROCESSING

Roving – In this step, the workers twist the sliver and draw it out to boost its strength. They wind it on spinning bobbins to get it ready for the last piece of the puzzle.

Spinning – This is the process of twisting and drawing out the hemp fibres. The goal is to create a smooth, continuous yarn. When using hemp, you can perform wet or dry spinning. Wet spinning is best for finer yarn, while dry spinning is ideal for coarser yarns. In general, manufacturers use wet spinning because hemp offers bast fibres. It is to complete the process via manual spinning using a spindle. This is a thin, round rod with tapered ends. It also has a weight attached to it.

TEXTILE PROCESSING

Weaving – After the raw materials have been converted into yarn, they’re ready for the next step in the production process, which involves joining these individual threads together to form fabric. This process of joining the yarn together is called weaving. Weaving is done on a machine known as a loom and requires two sets of yarn. The first set, called the warp set, is strung tautly across a metal frame. The second, called the weft, is connected to metal rods, with one thread per rod.

Cleaning – After the fabric has been woven, it’s removed from the loom and is ready for the final step. Fabric that’s fresh off the loom is called greige, and it looks nothing like the crisp white sheets or clothing you’re used to. It’s discolored and full of impurities, seed particles and debris. Before it can be transformed into useful textiles, it must go through a series of cleaning.

GARMENT PRODUCTION

Ready, Set, Let Us Design and Produce Your Clothes.

Contact us at operations@arqueen.ca

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Raw Material Handling

As we continue with our series “Fibre to Fashion”, here are some more interesting facts about HEMP fibres and how it is developed from the field to the closet.

For many, hemp is something that is just being discovered as a strong, organic fabric source and health aid. However, humans have been spinning hemp into a usable fibre and utilizing its medicinal benefits for thousands of years! The fast-growing, ultra-durable hemp plant is a variety of cannabis Sativa plant species. Let’s dive into the Handling of Raw Materials.

CULTIVATING
One of the great things about hemp is its ability to thrive in various environments. The main exceptions are high mountain and extreme desert regions. Hemp absorbs what’s in the soil, so growers need to test it before planting the seeds. The soil must not have a high degree of potassium sulphate, sulphur, or rock phosphate.

In general, the growing cycle for hemp is 108 – 120 days but the ideal timeframe for hemp clothing textile is between 80-90 days. Hemp is a relatively easy plant to grow organically because it doesn’t need many nutrients. It is also highly resistant to pests and diseases. Farmers tend to plant seeds densely to get plants with tall, slender stems. Such a crop will have plants with a high amount of fine fibres, ideal for creating fabric.

PLANTING
Any successful farmer will tell you that doing your homework is essential for starting off on the right foot; planning happens before planting! If you’re one of the tons of new farmers interested in breaking into the hemp industry, it’s crucial to understand as much as you can of this rapidly growing industry before you jump in. 

Preparing to plant is a process done first on paper and then in the dirt. You need to know your goals and how to best achieve them, then understand your soil and climate conditions, and finally make a plan to manipulate those factors to give your seeds the best opportunity to grow. Once all that work has been done, the actual work in the field can be minimal and relatively simple. Without that forward-thinking, though, poor planting can end your harvest before it even begins.

HARVESTING
After approximately 90 – 100 days in the ground, the hemp plant’s head is usually matured. Growers must closely analyze the crop to see seed heads developing from the bottom and moving up. After maturation, they expose their seeds. Farmers can then air dry them.

Farmers require combines to complete the harvesting process. Organically grown hemp produces around 350 pounds of fibre per acre. Inorganically grown hemp produces twice that amount. Typically, growers can expect anywhere from 1 to 3 tons of hemp fibre per acre.

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HEMP RESURGENCE

Hemp textile is making a comeback after being away for decades. With the new and improved policies In Canada, it is permissible to grow industrial hemp with a license, which was legalized in 1998.

How Is Hemp Textile for Clothing Produced?


It all begins with the following high-level steps while keeping the environment in our hearts and minds:

  1. Raw Material Handling
  2. Product Processing
  3. Consumer Delivery and Packaging
  4. Disposals and Recycling

Stay tuned for our series on “From Fibre to Fashion” #fromfibretofashion as we continue to grow together.

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What is Hemp?

Hemp can benefit many sectors and industries and can have a considerable impact on the sustainability of our world. One of those ways is through processing Hemp into textile sources.

Before the 1800s, Hemp was the go-to textile for clothing, ropes, and canvas. With the ease of the cotton gin and prohibition of cannabis in 1937, Hemp became a forgotten textile. Currently, our number one source for fabric is cotton. This is unfortunate because it is clear that Hemp is superior to cotton, and here are some reasons why

☘ On average, one acre of Hemp can produce two to three times more fiber than one: acre of cotton.

☘ Hemp detoxifies the soil by removing harmful chemicals and pollutants while enriching the soil with nitrogen and oxygen. Cotton takes a tremendous toll on the soil.

☘ Nearly 10% of all agricultural chemicals and 25% of insecticides come from the cotton industry, which bleeds into our soil, rivers, and streams. Hemp can grow with fewer chemicals, or many times, none at all.

☘ Hemp needs one-third of the water that cotton needs to grow.

☘ Hemp is three to eight times stronger than cotton (depending on how it is processed). Hemp textile products will last longer.

☘ Hemp textile breathes exceptionally well, is moisture absorbent, UV protectant, and anti-bacterial.