Rethinking circular according to The North Face: the Alpine Polartec collection.

Rethinking circular according to The North Face: the Alpine Polartec collection.

The result of the circular design project, the 200 Alpine Polartec fleece collection provides recycled and recyclable products.

Since The North Face launched its iconic Denali Fleece in 1988, Polartec and The North Face have always been a winning combination. Today, more than 30 years later, the two companies keep collaborating on new design: Circular Design. In 2020, The North Face launched the Renewed Design Residency program to offer its designers the opportunity to learn the principles of circular design and put them into practice in order to develop future products. Projects have focused on reducing waste, planning the disassembly phase, and implementing cyclicity at the end of the garment’s useful life through careful single-material production.

During the testing period leading up to the creation of the Alpine Polartec collection, The North Face found that the new products made can be disassembled in 6 seconds, while 97 percent of the materials can be reused. In the fall of 2022, the Alpine Polartec collection was thus launched, the first in the Circular Design project, made from recycled materials and designed to be recycled again. The first step in making this collection a reality was to find a suitable single-material fabric that was fully recycled and recyclable, but that did not give up, even in part, the performance offered by virgin fleece. Polartec 200 Series Fleece, the fleece produced using 100 percent recycled polyester, was the natural choice.

The next step was to redesign the trim and fasteners to be 100% polyester where possible so that they could be recycled with the garment at the end of its life cycle. Other trim elements, such as, for example, zippers, have been reduced to minimize the steps of dismantling before the clothes are recycled.
In addition to all this, to facilitate the recycling process, The North Face has improved its take-back policy with the new Renewed Take-back Program. Customers can drop off their used garments at a retail store, and the products will be given a second life. Depending on their condition, the items can be resold, recycled or donated.

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