Intro

Digitalisation has had an unprecedented impact on the fashion industry, expanding the field of creative possibilities for designers in the virtual domain. Textile archives, which are repositories of historical textile collections, are a good example of how the digital can provide designers with new ideas and opportunities by reinterpreting the past (Almond 2020, Melchior & Svensson 2014). In fact, digital access to historical textile collections has historically served as a rich source of inspiration for designers, encouraging them to explore traditional textile techniques, materials, and motifs, and reinterpret them in contemporary and sustainable ways. Building on the archive model and bridging this gap in information about new material possibilities, material libraries have emerged. Material libraries, hosting textile collections, are specialised facilities that house a curated collection of textiles and related materials for the purpose of research, education, and creative exploration. These libraries are typically curated and managed by institutions such as universities, research institutions, museums, or private organisations, and they serve as valuable resources for professionals in fields such as fashion, textile design, interior design, and other related disciplines. The digital services offered by these libraries provide an opportunity for designers to experiment with virtual prototyping, 3D design, and digital textile printing, reducing the need for physical samples and minimising material waste in the design process. Access to these online repositories can thus encourage sustainable design practices and foster innovation in the field of textiles and fashion. 

There are less than ten material libraries in Europe, which poses a barrier for designers in terms of accessibility. While some of them do offer online consultation of their textile collections, these experiences prove to be many times superficial as they do not engage the entire knowledge system around sustainability knowledge of textiles.

Other relevant material archives including textiles are:

1. MaterO: MateriO is an online platform offering access to over 9000 extradorinary materials, among which different types of textiles such as coated textiles, fiberglass textiles etc. The archive however is not exclusively dedicated to textiles and accessibility is limited to paid subscriptions. 

2. Green Designs: Green Designs collects sustainable products and highlights sustainable materials.

3. Material Driven: Material Driven is a design agency and a material library. They are experts in locating and sourcing innovative materials, understanding their applications and impact across industries.

4. Material District: Material District empowers global innovation by match-making material needs with material solutions.

5. Matmatch: Matmatch connects engineers, product designers, and procurement teams with the best materials and suppliers for their projects through a comprehensive materials database.

6. Material Bank: Material Bank is a marketplace for design professionals and brands in the architecture and design industry.

In the past years we have seen a steep rise in the number of sustainable textiles, as an alternative to counterbalance the drammatic effect of the fashion industry on the health of our planet. New alternative fibers, recyclable materials, natural dyes, 3D printed materials, self-cleaning clothes and highly engineered fibers using nanoparticles or other fabbircation methods have pushed the market towards a continous innovation process. However, making sense of what sustainable innovation means in the field of textile and fashion is a complex process. Contrary to the common idea that textiles need to be environmentally friendly, a broader approach to sustainability is needed to explore the real extent of sustainability in textile fiber production. Social aspects and economic aspects are rarely considered when assessing sustainable textiles, in favour of the ecological impact (CO2 emissions, water usage, chemicals usage, energetic consumption etc). To expand the view on what we understand by sustainability of textile innovation is fundamental for the future, if we want to advance towards a caring and respectful fashion industry. To facilitate the understanding of sustainability under this lens, we have established in our project two major categories of sustainable textile innovations. These are based on the purpose and also means of development of textiles:

1. Engineered and/or repurposed fibers.

Reusing biological waste is an important process in creating new textile fibers. Examples include: prickly pear leather, orange waste fibers, olive tree waste fibers and wine waste fibers.

2. Localised production or hertage assets:

In terms of local production, this type of textiles uses locally-sourced primary materials to develop fibers. Such processes are often connected to heritage practices and traditions which are centuries old. Examples include: fish skin leather (can be also engineered through an industrial process), mushroom leather, hemp fibers, nettle fibers etc.

If on the one hand we speak more and more about textile innovations and how they can have a positive turnaround on our planet by directing fashion practices towards more sustainable outcomes, we still know little about how sustainable these innovations actually are. How can we measure sustainability of such textiles? To do this, we need a reliable measuring system that enables us to quantify sustainability based on performance indicators.

Such indicators could fall within three main categories:

1. Environmental indicators focussing on ecological impact factors: carbon footprint, use of chemicals, water usage, waste reduction, land use etc

2. Social sustainability focussing on labour-related factors: fair labor, community impact, worker safety etc

3. Economic sustainability focussing on  market-related factors: cost-effectiveness, market viability of the product etc.

Based on these three categories of indicators, we have set up a measuring system that scores each textile innovation on a scale from 1 to 5 (5 being the max. sustainability level and 1 the lowest) and then created the statistical average to obtain a final score of sustainability for each case of textile innovation. Te score is an important indicator that offers more transparency in terms of the levels of sustainability of individual textiles, counterbalancing the risk of green washing.

Socio-environmental report cards are a measuring system developed by the University of Maryland, to assess the environmental impact of ecosystems. The report cards are proven tools for measuring social, environmental, and economic health, and create social capital through the collaborative process used to create them. They  synthesize data from scientists and volunteers and convert it into an image-rich format that is easily accessible to a wide stakeholder audience. In Sustainaique, we used the model of the report cards to develop a tailored measuring system for textile innovations. The section entitled: Five steps for creating socio-environmental report cards explains the process we used to develop the measuring system for Sustainique.