Recycled Polyester

Our polyester garments are made of polyester from 100% recycled plastic bottles, i.e. post-consumer waste that otherwise risks ending up in landfills. By working with the recycled alternative, we can sidestep the oil extraction required to make virgin polyester, thus lowering (our) CO₂ emissions.

What is polyester?
Conventional polyester is a synthetic fiber made with petroleum (crude oil) or natural gas, both of which are non-renewable resources. From a sustainability viewpoint, conventional polyester is thus considered really bad since its production is chemical, energy, and water intensive, resulting in toxic waste and the emission of greenhouse gasses. Additionally, it produces even more plastic waste once the garment is not used anymore.

To avoid the oil extraction that the production of new polyester requires, other types of already existing plastic products can be recycled, for example, PET bottles. Our recycled polyester derives from discarded plastic bottles, "post-consumer"-plastic, i.e. recycled after it has been used. The post-consumer waste is then mechanically crushed into pellets, turned into fibers, and then spun into yarns, resulting in a durable, functional fabric mainly used for our outerwear and swimwear. It’s our second most used fiber, representing around 10% of our production in volume.

Polyester made from recycled bottles is not a perfect solution
The advantages of choosing polyester made from recycled PET bottles instead of virgin poly are as mentioned above, quite many. However, polyester made from recycled bottles is not a perfect solution. The material itself (recycled poly) is hard to re-recycle while bottles on the other hand can be re-recycled, even if only a small % is actually being recycled world-wise, and it still sheds microplastic.

Read more about recycled polyester here.