Designing Cyclability: re-active and pro-active approaches to lifecycle design for textile products

Abstract

Design for Cyclability is something of a holy grail for sustainable designers – the promise of a contained and never-ending supply loop of material resources which don’t require further materials extraction from an already depleted global supply promises a more sustainable future. But the reality of designing in this context presents the designer with many challenges. In order to consider a products eventual incorporation back into the materials pool, the designer must understand the processes at end-of-life and create products which are truly recyclable. Often, on the journey from raw material to product, previously recyclable resources are transformed and inextricably fused together to create material mixes or ‘monstrous hybrids’ as coined by McDonough and Braungart (2002) which ensure a one-way route to landfill. How can designers begin to approach working with materials differently, designing them with a recycling system in mind at the outset? Suren Jelinski et al (1992) and Erkman (2007) describe a need for this approach in their papers on ‘Industrial Ecology’, even suggesting that new roles will emerge in the future purely for the interpretation of material systems so that we can work better with them.

There are two ways to approach material recycling for designers: they can either work with existing material waste streams - a ‘re-active’ approach, or they can design from the outset for the product to be ‘closed loop – a ‘pro-active’ systems approach. Many design approaches to recycling are reactive and could be described as ‘extended life techniques’ rather than true ‘design for recycling’. In order to design fully recyclable textile products, potential barriers to recycling needed to be identified and ‘designed out’ at the production stages.

At end-of-life there are many ways to recycle garments/textiles, and ‘closing the loop’ is obviously the ultimate state. However, it is important to consider what the other options are – re-use; recycling at garment level; recycling at fibre level; recycling at chemical level, and how they relate to each other. This ‘Hierarchy of Recycling’ will be layered over the two approaches described above, to further define design strategies.

Although pro-active strategies are a key area for designers to develop, a re-active approach will continue to be needed to address the waste already in the system. Both of these options are vital areas for innovation and will be discussed in the context of design strategy.
We need to shift the act of design from a ‘product’ focused activity to a more systems based approach. This paper will introduce lifecycle thinking as a visual framework for design ideation that allows for a deeper understanding of the key issues and barriers to closing the loop on textiles. By mapping the varied routes around and through the lifecycle we can define new briefs for the designer working in this field. The author has tested and reflected on this model through a series of case studies of designer-maker and industry projects and also through her own studio practice, developing new production techniques for recyclable textiles, towards a more connected materials economy.