Handbook of Sustainable Luxury Textiles and Fashion

The lotus flower—of great religious and cultural significance- is adored for its characteristic of rising above the muddy water, indicating how one can rise above defilements of life. Apart from motivation for life, the plant also provides fibers which are used for making a rare kind of cloth matching with the flawless virtues of silk. Extracting fibers from the lotus stems have been in practice since 1910. Later during the 90’s designers of Japan setup workshops to create a foreign market for their fabric. But due to low demand in Japan, the lotus fiber fabric remained a rare and handmade textile. The lotus plants are pure by virtue, and they radiate this purity through their fibers. The fabrics are 100 % organic, and hence they are environmentally friendly. The entire process of fiber extraction, spinning it into yarn and making the fabric is completely handmade making the process time-consuming. This also limits the quantity of the fabric produced. Stems of the lotus plants are collected, cut, snapped, and twisted to expose their fibers. These are thin and white filaments around 20–30 in number, which are rolled into a single thread. Around 20–25 women are needed to extract fibers this way for one weaver to work with. Fibers extracted from the stem are spun into yarn. The extracted fibers are placed in the skeins on a bamboo spinning frame preparing them for warping. Yarns are made by placing the fibers on a bamboo spinning frame and transferring the thread into winders for warping. With much care, not to get tangles, threads up to 40 m long are made. These threads are then taken from the warping posts, and are coiled into huge plastic bags. Yarns for the weft are wound into bamboo bobbins. Yarns are woven in manual looms. Excess warp is stored and later released during the course of weaving. During the weaving process, threads are frequently moistened with water, as the lotus fibers need to be kept cool. The fibers are very delicate and should be woven within 24 h of being extracted so as to prevent their deterioration. The fabric looks like a blend of linen and silk, and has wrinkle resistant and breathable properties given by the molecular makeup of the lotus plant. Based on the experience of the Italian luxury brand Loro Piana, but mainly in the Somatoa, a company founded by Awen Delaval in Cambodia, this chapter examines the potential of this fiber in the (sustainable) luxury sector.

Nettle is a common herbaceous plant, which regroups 30–45 species. It is part of the Urticaceae family such as ramie (Asian nettle, Boehmeria nivea) and belongs to the genus Urtica. The stinging nettle (Urtica Dioica) is the most prominent species in Europe and Himalayan ranges. This fibre also belongs to an ancient textile fibre. In this chapter deals with different aspects of sustainable process of production of fibre, methods of fibre extraction and their advantages, properties of nettle fibre, products from nettle and its blends. A comprehensive effort has been made to revamp the potentiality of sustainable development of fashionable textile and industrial materials from nettle fibre as well as form its byproducts. Overall, chapter covers various nettle-based handicraft and apparel products for luxury sector and their proper disposal.

Increasingly, the world is realizing that better use must be made of precious natural resources. Today, with the enrichment of people’s awareness on environment problems and the demand of environment-friendly fabric, natural fibers have received a great deal of attention due to their great importance of “green” and health protection properties and have been widely used in many fields, such as textile industry and daily life. Traditional resource of four natural fibers, cotton, wool, silk, and flax is after all limited. So, many new plant fibers, such as hemp, apocynum, mulberry bast fiber, pineapple leaf fiber, banana fiber, bamboo fiber, kapok fiber, and so on, have been exploited in recent years. The luxury sector, particularly fashion has a high environmental footprint and is responsible for a significant amount of waste. Designers committed to sustainable processes face a severe lack of options in terms of the actual goods used to make their products, with everything from fabric to embellishments being in short and expensive supply. This chapter aims to give an insight into the comprehensive details of conventional as well as unconventional sustainable luxury fibers which are going to be dominated in luxury fashion industry in the forthcoming years.

Luxury textile industries are in a big dilemma. On one hand, they need to uplift their brand value, and on the other hand they need to support sustainability as the consumers of luxury textiles are rich and literate. They are particularly more concerned about the sustainability issues. Like those of other textile industries, the luxury textile industries are under intense consumer as well as stakeholder scrutiny. The demands of consumers are not only limited to the marketed products being safe, but also that they are processed sustainably under safe and humane conditions. The sustainability issues are based on four main pillars: environmental, social, ethical and economic. The recent recession showed that weakening of social and economic pillars affect the environmental and ethical pillars. When recession starts to have an effect, the environmental and ethical pillars become neglected. In this chapter, what type of fibers are used in luxury textiles, what is meant by ‘sustainability’ and why it is important in luxury textile industry, how it is measured and the future trends to make luxury textile processing sustainable are discussed.

The recycling of textiles is heavily based on the material type and treatment of the fibre material. Especially materials that do not allow a recovery of the raw material in virgin material quality limit the possibilities of textile recycling significantly. This circumstance leads to great amounts of accumulating worldwide textile waste that is not yet processed into new valuable products. In this section, the authors will show two strategies for the re-use and recycling of high valuable fibre materials like polyamide and carbon used in luxury applications. Afterwards, two case studies are presented to validate the presented concepts.

In the last few decades, people have become more concerned about their health, hygiene, lifestyle, fashion, comfort, luxury, and wellbeing. Those belonging to economically well-off sections are more often choosing to buy luxurious textiles, not only to exhibit their high social and well-off strata, but also from the compulsion in health and hygienic necessity of the present day. In the production of luxurious textiles, natural fibres like cotton, silk and wool, and man-made fibres, like polyester, acrylic and regenerated rayon (viscose) play important roles. Recently, due to the rapid growth of nanoscience and technology, various organic and inorganic nanoparticles, such as silver (Ag), TiO₂, ZnO, SiO₂, lignin, and Chitosan have been applied to impart attributes needed for health and hygiene, UV protection, self-cleaned, and skin-care functionalities, both in natural and synthetic textiles. Similarly, various plant molecules, biomaterials and bio-polymers, such as banana pseudostem sap (BPS), grape and mulberry fruit extracts, natural dyes, Chitosan, tulsi, silk-sericin, aloe Vera, honey, almonds, cucumber, and mint have been applied in textiles for improvement in antimicrobial, UV-protective, anti-oxidant, skin-nourishing, and hydrophilic properties. Natural extracts of jasmine, lavender, Champa sandalwood and such others containing active ingredients like santalols, fusanol, santene, teresantol, benzyl acetate, linalool, linalyl acetate, and benzyl benzoate have also been added in textiles for their mind-refreshing fragrance and for skin nourishing, smoothening of facial lines/wrinkles and providing impetus to immune, nervous, and brain psychological system. The requirement of various attributes for professional clothing like wrinkle-resistance, comfort and self-cleaning of fabric surface have been incorporated in textiles to develop aristocratic, social, religious, business, and ritual party outfit. High value Cosmeto-textile and Ayurvastra have also been designed for slimming, moisturising, perfuming, healthy, fresh feeling and curing/healing of many diseases in a holistic approach by taking cue from the traditional knowledge of cosmetics, Ayurveda and clothing science. As these high value textiles are produced mostly from the natural fibres and functionalized using natural products/biomaterials, they can be effectively used for the production of sustainable luxurious textiles.

Although the market share for the luxury apparel has increased considerably, the industry, however, is perceived to be lagging behind in sustainable practices. This chapter identifies sustainable practices within luxury apparel brands against Global Reporting Indicators (GRI) and extends the ‘Greening Goliaths versus Emerging Davids’ conceptual framework for classifying the luxury brands. Using the case study approach, this chapter analyzes sustainable practices of nine global luxury brands and classifies them into four clusters: Ecopreneurs, Greening Goliaths, Emerging Davids, and Sustainable Entrepreneurs. Results indicate that true artisanal brands with third party accreditation in sustainable reporting such as Prada and Gucci emerged as sustainable entrepreneurs. On the other hand, Ralph Lauren a ready-to-wear luxury brand with emphasis on economic values emerged as an ecopreneurs.