Top 7 Recyclable Fabrics for Your Corporate Apparel

Apparel is one of the top choices for corporate merchandise, trade show swag, event uniforms, and employee dress. After all, everyone needs to wear clothing as part of polite society, right?

One of the biggest hurdles an ethical company faces is dealing with the overall fashion and apparel industries when picking corporate apparel. It's not just about finding the right kind of manufacturer for the volume, design, and style you want. It's about the ethical manufacture and green production behind it.

The fashion industry has long been among the worst in terms of emissions, water pollution, and inhumane treatment of people. That has been changing in recent years due to societal pressure, but there is still a broad range from the most ethically-produced apparel and the apparel that is… less so.

While it can be difficult to fully vet an apparel company, one primary factor you can examine is the fabric they use. Different kinds of fabrics have different kinds of production processes and different levels of environmental impact.

You also have to consider more than just the manufacture of the fabric. Even a sustainably-made fabric falls flat if, when it's discarded, it lingers in landfills for centuries or breaks down into countless microplastics.

One way to help, then, is to focus on what happens after you're done with your corporate apparel. How well can the fabric used in your apparel be recycled?

Some fabrics can't be recycled at all. While they might be able to be upcycled, recycling is usually better for large-scale reuse of corporate apparel. So, it pays dividends over time to select an apparel supplier that uses a recyclable fabric.

The question then becomes: what are the most recyclable fabrics, and what are their pros and cons? Which should you choose for your corporate apparel? Read on for our analysis.

#1: Organic Cotton

One of the best fabrics when it comes to sustainability and recyclability – when done right – is cotton. Cotton is tricky, though. It's an organic fiber grown from plants, and it has a very long history of global exploitation, from slavery involved in growing and harvesting it, to planting fields in unsuitable locations and destroying local watersheds, and much more.

Modern cotton is a lot better in general than it used to be. There's still a range of ethical and green suppliers throughout the apparel industry, but it's entirely possible to find an extremely ethical source. For example, our t-shirts are 100% ethical cotton that is grown, harvested, ginned, and turned into fabric entirely through union-supported and sustainable production.

Cotton is a very durable and long-lived fabric, which makes it ideal for workwear and other kinds of apparel. It's also possible to recycle, and while the recycling process still needs refinement, it's a lot better than the equivalent processes for a lot of inorganic plastic-derived fabrics.

#2: Tencel

Tencel is a relatively new fabric, invented in the 70s and trademarked in the 80s. Despite the name, it's not a synthetic material; it's made from the wood pulp of eucalyptus trees. It's also very well-controlled in manufacturing, and while it does use harsh chemicals and solvents to produce it, it's a closed-loop system where 99% of the solvents used in its production are recycled and reused.

The production of Tencel is also part of the closed-loop system, and since eucalyptus is a relatively water-light crop, it doesn't require as much harsh impact on water systems as other crops.

Since Tencel is a relatively new fabric, there aren't as many ways to recycle it, but it can be recycled, and there are an increasing number of groups developing ways to do so. Don't worry too much, though; because it's organic wood pulp, it biodegrades in a matter of months and doesn't leave behind the sorts of impacts other fabrics do. It's still a robust part of the circular apparel concept, even if it's not as immediately recycled like more traditional fabrics.

#3: Econyl

If we told you up top that Nylon would be on this list, would you believe us?

Econyl is nylon, but it's a recycled version of nylon itself. Nylon items like fishing nets, carpets, and nylon fabrics can be recovered from the supply lines at the end of their lifespan or even harvested from beaches, ocean cleanup efforts, and landfills. The nylon items recovered this way are processed through a closed-loop system to create Econyl.

Econyl itself is essentially a nylon fabric, with many of the same pros and cons of nylon. However, it's also 100% recyclable. Econyl can be recovered and used to produce more Econyl, making it a very circular option.

Choosing something like Econyl over other fabrics helps reduce the production of virgin nylon, reduces crude oil usage, reduces carbon emissions, and helps clean up waste around the world.

It's not free of downsides, though. Econyl is decidedly not biodegradable, so while it can be recycled repeatedly, there's always going to be some loss. It's difficult to consider it sustainable in the same way as some other fabrics on this list.

#4: Linen

While many people tend to think of linen as a type of product – your linens are your bedsheets, tablecloths, towels, and the like – that's a colloquial use based on the type of fabric often used to make them. Linen as a fabric is an organic fabric made from flax. It has existed for a very long time, and it has a lot of benefits, from durability to pest resistance to the fact that it's 100% biodegradable.

Linen is also increasingly recycled. The fabric can be shredded and carded into new fabrics, compressed into textile fillings for mattresses and stuffed items, or resold as raw materials for other kinds of production.

Linen recycling is beneficial in that it removes linen from waste lines and landfills, it doesn't involve much in the way of chemical processes (beyond some redying, which is minimized as much as possible), and it can even be recycled multiple times, though not indefinitely.

#5: Wool

Wool is another somewhat tricky material to bring up with this discussion.

It's an organic material, the hair of a sheep sheared off and processed into fabric. Unlike what PETA would have you believe, this process doesn't harm the sheep – and in fact, sheep that aren't sheared can suffer from heatstroke, the weight of the coat, and more – but there can be unethical treatment of the animals that needs consideration.

On the opposite end of the supply chain, wool is biodegradable, but it breaks down in different ways depending on the conditions. Properly managed, wool can break down into carbon, nitrogen, and other elements that can even enrich soil. On the other hand, under uncontrolled conditions, it often breaks down into methane, a dangerous greenhouse gas.

The plus side is that wool is very easy to recycle as far as fabrics go. The recycling process is common and well-understood, with a lot of existing processes for recycling wool already in place. This can make it an exceptional option for certain kinds of corporate apparel.

Be aware that wool's material properties mean that it might not be ideal for every kind of apparel, so make sure you know what you can and can't get using wool before you go all-in on it as your fabric of choice.

#6: Hemp

Hemp is a fabric that has a bad rap, and it's entirely due to two converging factors: the criminalization of cannabis (a closely related plant) and lobbying from the cotton industry many years ago.

Hemp is a very fast-growing plant with a huge array of uses, from medicinal to fabric to rope and more. It's organic, it's water-light, and it's low-impact on the environment. It can also be grown nearly anywhere in the world. It threatened to put other kinds of fabric out of commission, so it was essentially suppressed for many years.

Fortunately, industry and society are coming around, and hemp is more and more prominent. The fabric made from hemp is sustainable, but it's not without a few downsides. It can be expensive (for now), it can lose color more rapidly than other fabrics, and it requires more maintenance. It's prone to wrinkles and creases, as well.

On the flip side, hemp is extremely recyclable. Hemp fabrics can be recycled into more hemp fabrics or into other kinds of materials. While it's sometimes blended with other fabrics (and thus produces something that can't be as readily recycled afterward), it can also biodegrade quite easily.

#7: PET

This one is a divisive inclusion on this list. Polyester, or PET, is a plastic, which means it's decidedly not good for the environment, and we generally recommend avoiding it as much as possible.

However, polyester itself can be recycled, producing what's known as rPET. This form of recycled polyester involves taking discarded PET, such as bottles and other plastics, and processing them into plastic pellets that can be spun out into thin threads and woven into fabric.

There are a lot of downsides here. Fabrics made from rPET are often lower quality than other fabrics, and the recycling process can only be done once. This means that, while it's delayed in when it hits the end of its lifespan, it does still eventually reach a point where it's not recyclable.

Of all the entries on this list, PET is probably the worst, but it's also extremely common. If you go out of your way to make sure your PET apparel is recycled after use, it can be better than some other options, but you're still better off if you pick something like cotton or wool instead.

Are Recyclable Fabrics Sustainable?

Something you might have thought about reading through this list is how some of the more recyclable options are not necessarily sustainable. PET and Econyl, for example, both shed microplastics when they're washed, which can make them less ideal for apparel than organic fabrics.

There are also a lot of examples of greenwashing in the textile space. Some forms of bamboo fabrics, for example, are commonly presented as a great option because bamboo is organic, fast-growing, and water-light. However, one of the ways to make fabric out of bamboo is to use intense chemical treatment with a lot of emissions and waste, and the resulting product is chemically identical to rayon. It's very much not an environmentally friendly material, despite its origin. Bamboo fabrics can be sustainable, but not all of them are, so it's tricky.

The fact is, being able to recycle a fabric does not necessarily mean that the fabric is good in other respects. Recyclability is just one element of a fully sustainable, circular production environment.

That means you need to evaluate what your goals are and where you would rather put your efforts. Choosing a fabric for your corporate apparel that can be readily recycled might mean sacrificing some of the sustainability of eco-friendly production of another kind of fabric.

In general, we tend to prefer organic cotton and cotton blends, especially when we can work with the farms directly and understand their production methods. The more you can validate and verify the origins and production of the fabric, the more you can rest assured that it's sustainable and causes as little impact as possible.

This is all why we don't recommend chasing one particular variation of perfect. A perfectly recyclable fabric is not necessarily beneficial in other ways. Similarly, a very eco-friendly production method for a fabric that ignores the end of the lifespan of the material is also not particularly good.

We go to great lengths to make sure the items we stock in our store are as good as possible on as many axes as possible. When you browse our shop, you can see badges on our items indicating where they excel, whether it's in the treatment of workers (via union-made items), reduced environmental impact from logistics (for USA-made items), or verified eco-friendly production. We're also always open to discussing the details; all you need to do is drop us a line.