Materials and Innovation

Vision

Invest in emerging innovations that revolutionise the fashion industry as we know it through our Fabrics of the Future initiative

Since 2019, we have been working hard to move away from conventional materials and switch to the best alternatives available on the market. For this reason, we created our Fabrics of the Future initiative to invest in innovative low-carbon materials that will play a crucial role in making fashion more responsible, like mycelium leather and jersey made from banana waste. In the new Gameplan 2.0 our work continues to centre around using the best available technologies on the market and prioritising lower-carbon alternatives.

Intro

In order to be transparent about how we classify our materials, we are open-sourcing our GANNI Fabric Score, an internal tool we use to make decisions on materials. The GANNI Fabric Score has 3 categories:

  • 1. Preferred
  • 2. Better
  • 3. Avoid

We aim to source 90% of our materials from Category 1: ‘Preferred’ by 2025. The reason we might still have to source from Category 2: ‘Better’ is largely due to the quality and technical composition of our clothing. We will make sure to update you on the progress here.

To place the materials in categories 1, 2 or 3 in the GANNI Fabric Score, we have used GANNI’s own carbon footprint data from Plan. A, the Higg MSI, and various industry reports e.g. Textile Exchange. The Fabric Score is updated annually to reflect any changes based on new data and insights.

See our Fabric Score here.

Materials

GOAL 16

100% of cotton, viscose, polyester and wool are Category 1 ‘ Preferred’ as per the GANNI Fabric Score by 2023

GOAL 17

90% of all materials used are Category 1 ‘Preferred’ as per the GANNI Fabric Score, of which 10% of materials used are produced with Fabric of the Future innovations by 2025

GOAL 18

10% of materials used are Category 2 ‘Better’ as per the GANNI Fabric Score with 0% ‘Avoid’ materials used by 2025

2022 progress

Cotton

Cotton accounts for roughly 30% of our total materials at GANNI, and is our second highest carbon emitter in terms of the total weight of the material. As of 2022, 98,5% of the cotton GANNI used was either organic or recycled, which marks a significant shift over the past 3 years. The last 1.5% is coming from some old conventional cotton that we had at one of our suppliers, we used this to create the GANNI X AHLUWALIA collaboration. From 2023, there will be no conventional cotton in our products. In the years to come, we will focus on shifting our reliance on organic cotton to focus more on lower-carbon Fabrics of the Future innovations.

Organic Cotton 98.3%

Recycled Cotton 0.2%

Conventional Cotton 1.5%

Organic Cotton 82%

Recycled Cotton 6%

Conventional Cotton 12%

Organic Cotton 61%

Recycled Cotton 12%

Conventional Cotton 27%

Viscose

Viscose makes up about 4% of GANNI’s total material usage, but is a high carbon emitter. In 2022, 54% of our viscose was either ECOVERO™ fibres, TENCEL™ Lyocell fibres LENZING™ REFIBRA™ or FSC certified. This is a good improvement from 2021, however this means we have a 45% gap to close over the next year. We still struggle to find alternatives to light, woven fabrics, which is why we are still working on a good solution for approximately half our viscose fibres. 2023 will be focused on increasing our use of the Fabric of the Future innovation, CIRCULOSE® – an alternative to viscose made of fabric waste.

LENZING™ ECOVERO™ Viscose, TENCEL™ Lyocell, REFIBRA™, FSC Certified 55%

Conventional Viscose 45%

LENZING™ ECOVERO™ Viscose 27%

Conventional Viscose 73%

LENZING™ ECOVERO™ Viscose 26%

Conventional Viscose 74%

Polyester

In 2021, recycled polyester made up 82% of our total usage and we are pleased to say that in 2022 we have increased that to 96%.  We will focus on switching the remaining 4% to recycled polyester or a more suitable responsible alternative. Recycled polyester is not the end goal, so we are exploring polyester alternatives through our Fabrics of the Future initiative. In total, our recycled polyester and polyester together account for almost 20% of all the materials we use.

Recycled Polyester 96%

Polyester 4%

Recycled Polyester 82%

Polyester 12%

Recycled Polyester 51%

Polyester 49%

Wool

As of 2022, 44% of the wool GANNI used was recycled, 8% organic, and 16% responsible carrying an animal welfare standard certification such as the Responsible Wool Standard (RWS). Wool currently makes up less than 10% of our total materials in terms of weight, but is also a high carbon emitter. In 2023, we will focus on closing the 32% conventional wool gap to ensure that 100% of our wool comes from the ‘Preferred’ category as per the GANNI Fabric Score.

Alpaca (RAS), Merino (RWS) , Mohair (RMS) 16%

Organic Wool 8%

Recycled Wool 44%

Conventional Wool 32%

Conventional Wool 54%

Wool 39%

Rws Merino 7%

Conventional Wool 46%

Wool 54%

Leather

We have added leather separately in this year's report as we recognise that this was a heavy focus in our Gameplan 1.0. We are still in the process of completely phasing out virgin animal leather from our shoes and accessories, which we aim to complete by the end of 2023. The bar chart below shows our 2022 status; in the Fabrics of the Future section we will talk more about the alternative materials we are sourcing to replace leather.

Conventional Leather 80%

Recycled Leather 12%

Vegea ™ 8%

Material Mix

NATURAL 54%

Synthetic 41%

Cellulose 5%

Fabrics of the Future

GOAL 19

Launch 6 Fabric of the Future innovations on the market throughout 2023

GOAL 20

10% of materials used in GANNI collections are from Fabrics of the Future by 2025

With our Fabrics of the Future initiative, we want to invest and nurture start-ups and innovators that are working to revolutionise the fashion industry by creating lower-impact materials of renewable resources and waste. Our priority is alternative materials that have a proven lower-carbon impact which currently looks like this: fibre-to-fibre technologies and alternatives to leather, cotton, viscose, and polyester.

We are currently exploring 33 innovations which we have grouped into four stages: Exploration, Prototyping, Launching Soon and Launched.

At the time of writing you can see our progress with the 33 innovators here:

progress

EXPLORATION 10/33

PROTOTYPING 9/33

LAUNCHING SOON 9/33

LAUNCHED 5/33

In 2022, we launched with 5 innovators and have 6 launches confirmed for 2023. You can stay up to date via @ganni.lab where you will be the first to know!

Mylo™

Mylo™, created by Bolt Threads, is an innovative material made from mycelium, the underground root-like system of fungi. Mushrooms are the fruits of mycelium and Mylo™ is widely known as “mushroom leather”. In June and October 2022, we used Mylo™ to create small wallets and bags sold in our Copenhagen and New York flagship store.

“We have set a drastic goal of phasing out virgin leather by 2023 and seeing innovative materials like Mylo transform into high quality design products only makes me more ambitious on GANNI’s behalf. It’s our job to create responsible solutions that aren’t just at par with traditional product offerings but exceed them.”

Nicolaj Reffstrup

Founder, GANNI

Stem

Copenhagen-based Stem is an industry-changing approach to how clothing is made. Sarah Stem has developed a zero-waste woven textile system that eliminates garment production waste. Stem garments are made from recycled natural fibres and are produced using their unique weaving, cutting and sewing technique. In June 2022, we launched a 3 piece collection with Stem. Each piece was made of 100% certified organic cotton with removable buttons, which increases the chance of the product being fully recycled with existing infrastructure.

Vegea™

VEGEA™ is an innovative material using left-over grape skins from winemaking, vegetable oils and natural fibres from agriculture. Using left-over material helps keep waste from ending up in landfills. No toxic chemicals, heavy metals or other dangerous solvents are used in the REACH-compliant production process. VEGEA™ has a high proportion of plant-based content (55% Bio-compound (vegetable oil and grape) and 45% Water based-PU). We launched our first products with VEGEA™ in 2021 and continued to launch more shoes in VEGEA™ throughout 2022.

Pyratex®

Madrid-based company PYRATEX® has created a material that transforms agri-waste from banana farming into a cotton-like textile. Bio-waste from the banana food industry is traditionally burned after the harvesting process, which produces high CO2 emissions. PYRATEX® element 2 prevents the emissions that would otherwise be released during burning and provide local farmers with an additional income stream. Containing 65% organic cotton and 35% banana agri-waste, PYRATEX® element 2 was introduced in GANNI’s collections in June 2022 with three limited edition ready-to-wear pieces consisting of tracksuit pants, a hoodie and a cropped fitted top.

Circulose by Renewcell

Renewcell is a fast-growing Swedish textile recycling company with a breakthrough technology for recycling textile waste into a new material called CIRCULOSE®. The mission is to make fashion circular by producing a 100% recycled material that can then be recycled over and over again without losing quality. Renewcell aims to scale production capacity to be able to recycle 600 million t-shirts this year.

CIRCULOSE® is a new natural material made by recovering worn-out cotton clothes into a dissolving pulp. In a breakthrough process powered by 100% renewable energy, CIRCULOSE® transforms discarded textiles into a new material that does not require any cotton fields, oil or trees. In June 2022 we introduced two styles of pants, and in February 2023 we saw two denim shirts on our runway all made from CIRCULOSE®. GANNI is committed to incorporating more of the material into future collections throughout 2023.