A Critical Discussion of Business Model Strategies for Closing the Gap Between Recycled Textiles and New Feedstocks

This paper opens a critical discussion of the textile and fashion industry’s current focus on textile-to-textile recycling as a solution to positive sustainable impact and explores how experimentation in a local R&D factory may support the implementation of regenerative business models. The research engages the industry partners of the READY project as context, an R&D partnership that aims to establish a small-scale new material test factory in the Danish realm to support the transition from linear to circular business models. The paper specifically investigates current approaches of circular economy business models, and further explores opportunities in interdisciplinary and collaborative experimentations for reducing and slowing material and value loops