Fibre52’s cotton dyeing process retains cotton’s natural properties, resulting in a stronger, kinder fabric that offers moisture-management performance and strength properties that rival petrochemical-based textiles.
22 minutes | May 3, 2023
Graham Stewart is the EVP of Fibre52, a cost-effective, eco-conscious processing technology that massively decreases the environmental impact of cotton dyeing. Graham has decades of experience as a textile and apparel production fibre-to-brand specialist in the textile industry in production, marketing, and leadership roles. For the past two years, Graham has been developing Fibre52’s patent-pending technology, which retains cotton’s natural properties, resulting in a stronger, kinder fabric that offers moisture-management performance and strength properties that rival petrochemical-based textiles.
The dyeing and finishing processes required to make clothing are the most energy intensive and heavily polluting part of clothing manufacturing. Cotton – the most widely used natural fibre in textiles – requires a resource intensive dyeing process, using large amounts of water and heavy chemicals to give our clothing vibrant color, and to ensure the color doesn’t wash out or fade. This process is damaging to cotton fibres, resulting in weaker fabric. Is it possible to take a more environmentally sustainable approach to conventional cotton processing while remaining cost-effective?
Over his decades-long career in textile science and dyeing, Graham Stewart saw little technological improvement in processing and dyeing and the environmental impact of these processes. With his wealth of experience, Graham began to develop a proprietary process for dyeing cotton which significantly reduces the amount of water and energy required. Fibre52’s process can be used in current machinery with no additional capital investment, making the process scalable with low barriers to implementation. Their process also retains cotton’s natural strength, extending the life of the material and advancing the circular economy by making it possible to recycle the fibre more than once.