- Posted on 9 Apr 2025
- 5-minute read
New initiative aims to pioneer zero waste clothing from zero waste yarn in Australia.
In an innovative project aiming to transform fabric offcuts into new, wearable garments, local fashion label High Tea with Mrs Woo is collaborating with the Centre of Excellence in Sustainable Fashion & Textiles, a partnership between the UTS and TAFE NSW, and textile recycling expert Dempstah.
The “Zero Waste Clothing from Zero Waste Yarn” project – supported by a City of Sydney Ideas and Innovations grant – seeks to close the loop on post-production textile waste and advance circular economy practices in the fashion industry.
The project uses offcuts from High Tea with Mrs Woo’s production to develop recycled textile yarn with Dempstah that will be suitable for manufacturing garments using the cutting-edge Shima Seiki Wholegarment seamless industrial knitting machine at UTS, the first of its kind in a university setting worldwide.
Dr Nga Wun (Doris) Li, academic lead for seamless knitting research at the UTS School of Design, says the Shima Seiki Wholegarment knitting machine is a game-changer for sustainable fashion.
“It allows us to create entire garments without seams, significantly reducing waste and opening up new possibilities for design.”
For over a decade, High Tea with Mrs Woo has been collecting and storing their natural fibre post-production offcuts while continuing to search for a viable solution to close the loop, demonstrating a long-term commitment to sustainability.
Angela Foong, co-founder of High Tea with Mrs Woo, says the label has been determined to divert textile waste from landfill since its inception, and has finally achieved a breakthrough by developing a solution in partnership with Dempstah and The Billie Upcycling in Hong Kong.
“Through The Billie’s waterless and chemical-free mechanical textile recycling system, we were able to convert a small amount of our post-production textile offcuts into high-quality recycled 4-ply yarn suitable for hand-knitting. It got us thinking – is it possible to achieve an even finer yarn suitable for machine-knitting? Is it possible for our recycled yarn to be strong enough to knit a zero-waste garment on the Shima Seiki Wholegarment machine at UTS?”
This ambitious project is well underway, with the sorting of approximately 600kg of High Tea with Mrs Woo’s textile offcuts into colour and fibre type completed. In December 2024, these offcuts were sent by sea to Hong Kong, where they are now in the process of being broken down and spun into high-quality natural fibre recycled yarn with The Billie system.
Dr Li and her team at the Centre of Excellence in Sustainable Fashion & Textiles will play a crucial role in the next phase. While they await the delivery of High Tea with Mrs Woo’s recycled yarn, a yarn of similar structure and composition has been successfully tested on the Shima Seiki. Test panels have been knitted to demonstrate the best knit structures to use with the yarn, and the next step will be to knit new whole garments with this recycled yarn.
The Shima Seiki machine allows us to design and produce garments with unprecedented precision and efficiency, minimizing waste at every step of the process.
“The goal is to create two knitted whole garments on the Shima Seiki machine – one simple design and one more complex.”
Dr Li says this project is a perfect example of how academia and industry can work together to drive innovation in sustainable fashion, and it serves as a model for how we can rethink our approach to garment production.
“By combining innovation, new technologies and circular principles, we can significantly reduce waste and promote sustainable practices,” says Dr Li.
The fashion industry's impact on the environment is substantial. Australians are among the world's largest consumers of clothing, purchasing an average of 56 new items each year.
Alarmingly, more than 200,000 tonnes of clothing end up in landfill annually – the equivalent of almost four Sydney Harbour Bridges.
Foong says the City of Sydney is leading the way by investing in circular solutions.
“The project represents a significant step towards sustainable fashion in Sydney, demonstrating how local initiatives supported by city grants can drive industry-wide change towards more environmentally sustainable practices.”
While the project faces challenges such as fibre quality degradation and complexities in sorting blended materials, it represents a significant step toward implementing circular economy principles in fashion design and production.
The pilot could pave the way for broader adoption of sustainable practices in one of Australia's most wasteful industries.
“Our dream is that once we have established the viability of this zero-waste textile recycling process, this service can then be extended to other City of Sydney fashion and manufacturing businesses so we can collectively transition our local clothing and textile industry to a circular economy,” says Foong.
As part of Sydney Climate Action Week, the project team hosted a talk at and demonstration of the Shima Seiki machine at UTS.
Media Contact: Jacqueline Middleton
Image: Angela Foong and Shirley Tam discussing the project. Photo: High Tea with Mrs Woo.