Sustainable fashion: transdisciplinary approaches to innovation

Alicia Greated is the Chief Executive Officer for KTN.   

Previously Alicia was Global Director, Research Engagement at Heriot-Watt University and prior to that, led delivery of the Newton Fund (a £735million global research and innovation fund) on behalf of BEIS, UK government. 

She was also founder and Director of Research Council UK (RCUK) India at the British High Commission in Delhi, and Director RCUK China at the British Embassy in Beijing.  She has worked as acting Director of Research for the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and was Head of Engineering at the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).

Alicia is a Fellow of the Institution of Engineering and Technology, Fellow of the RSA and member of the UK Government’s Jet Zero Council.  She is also member of a number of advisory bodies including the Royal Society’s Science, Industry and Translation Committee and the Scottish Funding Council’s Research and Knowledge Exchange Committee.

Richard is a Professor of Marine Biology and Director of the University of Plymouth, Marine Institute. He is a world expert on plastic pollution. In 2004, he published the first paper describing the accumulation of microscopic fragments of plastic in the environment, naming them 'microplastics'.

He and his team have been at the forefront of microplastics research showing their global distribution, the potential for transfer from the gut to the circulatory system, and their role in the transport of chemicals. This pioneering work was pivotal in recognition of microplastic contamination in policy, such as Marine Strategy Framework Directive.

Liz is a Lecturer in Cultural and Historical Studies at London College of Fashion. She recently completed a Business of Fashion Textiles and Technology Post-doctoral Research Fellowship at the Victoria and Albert Museum. This fellowship focused on the transformative opportunities digital technologies offer the fashion retail and cultural sectors.

She has also worked as a museum curator and runs an online vintage business.

In February 2023, her book Wholesale Couture: London and Beyond, 1930-1970 was released with Bloomsbury.

Hannah Auerbach George is the Business of Fashion Textiles and Technology Research Fellow at the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Originally trained in Woven Textile Design at the Royal College of Arts, Hannah’s career within textiles has spanned industrial production, historical textiles, design, consultancy, research and education. Her research focuses on mining forgotten technologies to inform the development of sustainable future materials.

Hannah applies her diverse experience to every project she undertakes resulting in a distinctive approach routed in technique and process.

Professor Kate Goldsworthy is Chair of Circular Design & Innovation and Co-Director of the Centre for Circular Design, based at Chelsea College of Arts. She is also Deputy Director of the Business of Fashion, Textiles and Technology partnership (BFTT, 2018-23), funded by the UK Industrial Strategy (£5.5m) and managed by the AHRC.

Her core research interests are designing for sustainability, the circular economy and material innovation within textile and fashion contexts. Her methods are transdisciplinary and practice-led, with a focus on fibre-to-fibre recovery and new finishing technologies. This includes more sustainable production systems for the textile industry, and pioneering design solutions for the recycling and recovery of both synthetic polymers and bio-based materials.

She is a member of the EPSRC Peer Review College and was previously a member of their EC Forum in Manufacturing Research (2016-2020). She also advises on policy groups and industry boards, including a long-standing relationship with Worn Again Technologies, where she currently sits on their Circular Advisory Panel. Her creative work has been exhibited and collected internationally, and commissions include The Science Museum, The V&A and the Museum of Fine Arts Boston.

Liz is a Lecturer in Cultural and Historical Studies at London College of Fashion. She recently completed a Business of Fashion Textiles and Technology Post-doctoral Research Fellowship at the Victoria and Albert Museum. This fellowship focused on the transformative opportunities digital technologies offer the fashion retail and cultural sectors.

She has also worked as a museum curator and runs an online vintage business.

In February 2023, her book Wholesale Couture: London and Beyond, 1930-1970 was released with Bloomsbury.

Hannah Auerbach George is the Business of Fashion Textiles and Technology Research Fellow at the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Originally trained in Woven Textile Design at the Royal College of Arts, Hannah’s career within textiles has spanned industrial production, historical textiles, design, consultancy, research and education. Her research focuses on mining forgotten technologies to inform the development of sustainable future materials.

Hannah applies her diverse experience to every project she undertakes resulting in a distinctive approach routed in technique and process.

Professor Kate Goldsworthy is Chair of Circular Design & Innovation and Co-Director of the Centre for Circular Design, based at Chelsea College of Arts. She is also Deputy Director of the Business of Fashion, Textiles and Technology partnership (BFTT, 2018-23), funded by the UK Industrial Strategy (£5.5m) and managed by the AHRC.

Her core research interests are designing for sustainability, the circular economy and material innovation within textile and fashion contexts. Her methods are transdisciplinary and practice-led, with a focus on fibre-to-fibre recovery and new finishing technologies. This includes more sustainable production systems for the textile industry, and pioneering design solutions for the recycling and recovery of both synthetic polymers and bio-based materials.

She is a member of the EPSRC Peer Review College and was previously a member of their EC Forum in Manufacturing Research (2016-2020). She also advises on policy groups and industry boards, including a long-standing relationship with Worn Again Technologies, where she currently sits on their Circular Advisory Panel. Her creative work has been exhibited and collected internationally, and commissions include The Science Museum, The V&A and the Museum of Fine Arts Boston.

Joseph holds a doctorate and MChem degree in Green and Sustainable Chemistry from the Green Chemical Centre of Excellence, University of York, is a Member of the Royal Society of Chemistry (MRSC) and has been recognised for his work in the area of sustainability and the environment by being awarded a Chartered Environmentalist (CEnv) accreditation.

His historical research aims to reduce the impact of industrial waste biomass through valorisation routes in hopes of creating biorefinery systems for a more sustainable future. Working in collaboration with industry, economic and commercial feasibility is embedded across the entirety of Joseph's research. He has worked in the area of green chemistry for the last ten years and has devoted his research to improving the sustainability of the material and textile world over the last four years with projects involving the Leeds Institute of Textile and Colour (LITAC) and the Fashion and Textile Technology Institute (FTTI).

Joseph is currently the Senior R&D Project Manager at Virustatic, where he supports the company in the innovation of textile coatings to replace the use of toxic metal-based chemicals for the antimicrobial treatment of fabrics and textiles.

Dr Yudi Ding is the co-founder and CEO of Hide Biotech, a Cambridge-incubated startup transforming waste-derived collagen into novel fashion materials and beyond.

At Cambridge, he studied and researched organic and protein chemistry, which is key to Hide's protein-based technology.

Prior to his PhD, he obtained his MA degree in Chemical Engineering at the École Polytechnique. He has also worked for Johnson & Johnson in manufacturing quality assurance and the advanced research unit at L’Oréal developing new anti-ageing molecules.

He enjoys design, cooking, calligraphy and everything that involves creativity and precision.

Tim Cross, Director of Project Plan B, a thermomechanical textile polyester recycler in the UK, has 25 years of experience in garment manufacturing. In the last five years, he’s been focused on supporting fibre-to-fibre recycling systems specifically for post-consume textiles and embedding circular design and practice with brands and retailers.

Dr Aida Rafat is a Royal Academy of Engineering Enterprise Fellow and the CEO and founder of DyeRecycle.

Aida worked as chemical engineer in the oil & gas sector before she joined her PhD at Imperial College London to focus on building future sustainable chemical technologies, focusing primarily on waste valorisation and development of circular chemical processes.

Aida was the lead inventor of DyeRecycle technology and currently leading its commercialisation. DyeRecycle is the first technology to tackle chemical and fibre circularity providing recycled vibrant colours using textile waste while also enabling efficient fibre-to-fibre recycling by decolouring textile waste.

Dr Yudi Ding is the co-founder and CEO of Hide Biotech, a Cambridge-incubated startup transforming waste-derived collagen into novel fashion materials and beyond.

At Cambridge, he studied and researched organic and protein chemistry, which is key to Hide's protein-based technology.

Prior to his PhD, he obtained his MA degree in Chemical Engineering at the École Polytechnique. He has also worked for Johnson & Johnson in manufacturing quality assurance and the advanced research unit at L’Oréal developing new anti-ageing molecules.

He enjoys design, cooking, calligraphy and everything that involves creativity and precision.

Joseph holds a doctorate and MChem degree in Green and Sustainable Chemistry from the Green Chemical Centre of Excellence, University of York, is a Member of the Royal Society of Chemistry (MRSC) and has been recognised for his work in the area of sustainability and the environment by being awarded a Chartered Environmentalist (CEnv) accreditation.

His historical research aims to reduce the impact of industrial waste biomass through valorisation routes in hopes of creating biorefinery systems for a more sustainable future. Working in collaboration with industry, economic and commercial feasibility is embedded across the entirety of Joseph's research. He has worked in the area of green chemistry for the last ten years and has devoted his research to improving the sustainability of the material and textile world over the last four years with projects involving the Leeds Institute of Textile and Colour (LITAC) and the Fashion and Textile Technology Institute (FTTI).

Joseph is currently the Senior R&D Project Manager at Virustatic, where he supports the company in the innovation of textile coatings to replace the use of toxic metal-based chemicals for the antimicrobial treatment of fabrics and textiles.

Dr Aida Rafat is a Royal Academy of Engineering Enterprise Fellow and the CEO and founder of DyeRecycle.

Aida worked as chemical engineer in the oil & gas sector before she joined her PhD at Imperial College London to focus on building future sustainable chemical technologies, focusing primarily on waste valorisation and development of circular chemical processes.

Aida was the lead inventor of DyeRecycle technology and currently leading its commercialisation. DyeRecycle is the first technology to tackle chemical and fibre circularity providing recycled vibrant colours using textile waste while also enabling efficient fibre-to-fibre recycling by decolouring textile waste.

Tim Cross, Director of Project Plan B, a thermomechanical textile polyester recycler in the UK, has 25 years of experience in garment manufacturing. In the last five years, he’s been focused on supporting fibre-to-fibre recycling systems specifically for post-consume textiles and embedding circular design and practice with brands and retailers.

Lucy Hope is the Development Director at Virustatic. Virustatic has developed a novel, bioactive textile treatment that is naturally antimicrobial. The patented technology was first used in the market on the globally successful Virustatic SHIELD® product which is a breakthrough in viral filtration technology.

Lucy joined Virustatic when it was a disruptive innovation start-up and has helped steer the company into becoming a purpose-led award-winning business. In 2022, Virustatic won the MediWales Innovation Award in the Industry Judges category and its Virustatic SHIELD® product was acquisitioned by the Science Museum Group for the Science and Industry Museum Trust’s COVID-19 archive.

Lucy is a Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) alumna and works closely with an interdisciplinary team of green chemists, microbiologists and material scientists on innovation projects to further develop Virustatic’s sustainable antimicrobial coatings.

Sarah is a Lead Analyst in WRAP's Insights and Innovation team. She has worked as a research analyst for WRAP since 2005, except for a two-year stint at the Open University. During this time, she has managed evaluation and business behavioural research projects.

Since 2015 she has focussed primarily on researching the textiles industry; leading policy research for Defra's Waste Prevention team as well as the measurement of the voluntary agreement, Textiles 2030.

Mart is an engineer and co-founder at Teemill, a company that built and now shares access to a working circular supply chain for printed products. At the Teemill campus on the Isle of Wight, the team create technology to enable items to be produced to order in real-time, from organic materials using renewable energy, all designed to come back and be remade when worn out. Instead of creating waste, this enables new products to be made from it.

This technology is available as a cloud based solution via the Teemill.com platform. Teemill enables startups, businesses and charities to co-create the future of fashion. Today the team are working on sharing circular production systems with other businesses.

James has been the Head of the Soft Matter Group at Queen Mary University of London since 1994. His group examine the physical behaviour by experiment and modelling techniques of soft matter such as elastomers and rubber materials. Properties of interest include sensing, actuation, abrasion, friction, fracture, fatigue, viscoelastic behaviour, self-healing, recycling, ageing and reinforcement. His research group is currently the largest such group in the UK with a team of 14 postdoctoral researchers and PhD students.

James was made a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in 2020 and a National Teaching Fellow in 2009. James has been in a leadership role of the IOM3 Elastomer Group for 25 years, with whom he has organised more than 80 discussion meetings and conferences of interest to the rubber community. He was the Chairman of the International Rubber Conference in 2019 and RubberCon in 2014 and 2023.

Andrew Yip leads the materials and process innovation function within the PANGAIA R&D team, focusing on sustainable technologies in the areas of biopolymers, carbon-capture and utilization, green chemistry, waterless processing, and regenerative agriculture/agroforestry. He received his MS degree in Materials Science from the University of California Santa Barbara and BS in Physics from Johns Hopkins University. Since leaving school he has held various material development & commercialization roles at adidas and The North Face.

Andrew has contributed to a number of projects & patents such as the commercial launch of the world’s first fully-recyclable performance running shoe (adidas Made To Be Remade), the early development of the lowest carbon footprint performance running shoe (adidas x allbirds), one of the first engineered jacquard woven jackets in the outdoor industry (The North Face FuseForm), and numerous products that have been used in the harshest environments on Earth (The North Face Summit and Steep Series). In his spare time he likes to go rock climbing, hiking with his family, and learning new things.

Jane is Professor of Digital Design and Innovation, Director of the Fashion, Textiles and Technology Institute (FTTI) at University of the Arts London. She is also Director of the Business of Fashion, Textiles and Technology Creative R&D Partnership, as part of an £80million UK wide AHRC Creative Industries Cluster Programme (CICP), and Director of Research and Innovation (Stratford), which includes leadership of R&D initiatives aligned to the new UAL campus (Sept 2023), at East Bank, on the Queen Elizabeth Park, London.

She is a Co-I on an Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) Digital Economy Network Plus Award. Her research practice combines award winning expertise in textile design and creative computing, with a track record of leading collaborative XR, design research and R&D.

With board-level representation in sector-leading organisations such as the V&A, Scottish Arts Council, and advisory roles for the Royal Shakespeare Company, Arts Council England, Crafts Council and Arts Foundation, Jane is advisor to councils across UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), the EU Commission for ICT and various international research councils.

Richard is a Professor of Marine Biology and Director of the University of Plymouth, Marine Institute. He is a world expert on plastic pollution. In 2004, he published the first paper describing the accumulation of microscopic fragments of plastic in the environment, naming them 'microplastics'.

He and his team have been at the forefront of microplastics research showing their global distribution, the potential for transfer from the gut to the circulatory system, and their role in the transport of chemicals. This pioneering work was pivotal in recognition of microplastic contamination in policy, such as Marine Strategy Framework Directive.