Curious what the new year is expected to bring to the textile industry? Consider this.
According to Texcovery.com:
1. Digital textile printing ink -The New Pigmented Ink
“Digital textile printing ink is referred to as the ink that is tailored for clothing, garment, textile, household, and display applications. Digitally printed garments have characteristics such as durability, high color, and superior image quality. Moreover, digitally printed garments are witnessing increased popularity in India, owing to a rise in advertisement activities of customized garments such as t-shirts on social media platforms, which fuels the adoption of digital textile inks in garment application. The demand for luxurious home textile products is increasing in emerging economies of Asia-Pacific, which, in turn, is anticipated to augment the need for digital textile inks.
“A new pigmented ink that can print on all fabrics is truly a breakthrough in digital printing. The combined solution for digital printing, including a textile printer and a compatible ink that enables printing on a large number of fabrics, hastened the digital printing penetration into textile and fashion. The embracing of digital printing on textile is the driving force for the fashion industry and contributes to shaping not only the textile industry as a whole, including fashion but also the home décor and interior designing markets which can offer bountiful opportunities for personalized designs.
2. Textile Trends in Healthcare Industry: Bio Textiles
“Biotextiles are used in artificial hearts. With increasing innovations and developments in the healthcare industry, organ transplantations have been used to cater to the demands of patients suffering from acute organ failures. Further, there has been a growing demand for artificial organs across the globe on account of the increasing number of patients and lack of organ donors. Further, with technological advancements, artificial organs have been seen as an available option for organ transplantation. Recently new and advanced artificial organs have been introduced in the market with greater biocompatibility shelflife and safety.
“Biotextiles have used to a great extent in the production of artificial organs and thus with the growth in this market, the demand for biotextiles is also anticipated to increase on similar lines. Growing usage of artificial organs such as artificial hearts, artificial kidneys, etc. has assisted in prolonging the patient’s life and improving their lives. Moreover, increasing expenditure on healthcare activities and better patient outcomes is anticipated to boost the demand for bio textiles used in artificial organ applications. Also, the growing disposable income of people in the Asia Pacific is also expected to increase the demand for bio textiles in the near future.
3. smart fabrics & Intelligent Textiles
“Smart fabrics can sense different environmental conditions andintelligent textiles or e-textiles can not only sense environmental changes,but can automatically respond to their surroundings or stimuli, such asthermal, chemical, or mechanical changes, as well.
“The fashion and entertainment industry is using smart fabrics to incorporate unique aesthetics into clothing. Appearance features, such as color, size, or shape of garments, can be altered using technology woven into fabrics. Smart fabrics in clothes enable the user with the capability to interact with their surroundings and to communicate data via embedded sensors or conductive yarn through the clothes they wear with the wearable devices.?
“·In the fashion industry, the market studied is driven by innovations of the designers coming up with new and aesthetically pleasing outfits, integrated with a useful technical architecture capable of relaying information. Many brands, ranging from Uniqlo to Lululemon, are using smart fabrics to set their collections ahead of the pack.
“·Many prominent brands such as Under Armour, Levi’s, Tommy Hilfiger, among others, along with smaller companies such as Sensora, Loomia,Hexoskin, CuteCircuit, others are offering their smart clothing that are using smart fabrics to set their collections ahead of the others. For instance,CuteCircuit, are utilizing smart fabrics for their haute couture collections and specialty projects. CuteCircuit’s ’Hug Shirt’ allows the user to send electronic hugs through sensors within the garment.
“- The French startup Spinali Design makes high-end beachwear with integrated ultraviolet light sensors that tell the wearer when it’s time to apply sunscreen and distance trackers that tells the parents when the kids have wandered too close to the surf.
” Further, for the past few years, Google was working with LeviStraus on a future smart jean jacket under Project Jacquard, which could eventually lead to a jean jacket with smart fabric sleeves with built-in touch controls. In November 2019, the project was commercialized on new Jean jackets from Levis. The jacket costs USD 198 to USD 248.
” Furthermore, many technology giants such as Microsoft and apple are filing their patents for their technology integration with smart fabric. For instance, in October 2019, Apple filed a patent for integrating health monitoring technology into clothing.? Similarly, in November 2019,Microsoft filed a patent for smart fabric technology named Electronically Functional Yarn that will be embedded into yarns for electrical functionality. This technology can be used in the fashion and entertainment segment, as reported by the company.
4. Sustainability in Textiles – Upcycling and Recycling
“Whether it’s circularity, reducing microfibers polluting the world’s oceans or using more materials with less environmental impact, sustainability is front and center in the apparel sector, and brands that hadn’t been on board are joining the party. Because the industry—and the consumer—now demands it.
“· “Companies are beginning to mobilize and gear up for circularity,” according to the PreferredFiber report, which also noted that 24 percent of companies said they’ve already developed a circular textiles strategy, and 57 percent said they had one underway.
“· Innovators in the space, like Italy-based Orange Fibers, is making a silk-like fiber out of orange peels—700,000 tons of which would have ended up in landfills in Sicily.
“· Others, like Evrnu,are turning post-consumer cotton garment waste into cellulosic fibers that look and behave much like natural or synthetic fibers depending on the functions added, and Vegea has turned grape skins into a fabric akin to leather and has the backing of the H&M Foundation to help bring it to scale.
5. Demand of Organic Fabrics
“Clothes made from organic fabrics are easy to maintain and clean. Despite the low market share in clothing industry of India, on average organic clothes, demand is growing at the rate of 30% per year, which is quite encouraging. Designers are working towards making these clothes more appealing, fashionable, and economical. Down the line, after some years people would be spotted wearing trendy and stylish outfits made up of organic cotton and fabrics.
“Brand image plays a vital role in endorsing any new product in the consumer market. Many esteemed clothes brands have started using organic fabrics in their collections. For instance-Nike, Patagonia and Timberland use some percentage of organic fabrics in sportswear. Some of the international designers like Rogan Gregory, Katherine Hamnett and Stella McCartney use organic cotton in their designer outfits. Although not many people are aware of the ill-effects of formaldehyde and pesticides on our environment, but slowly and steadily the trend of using organic clothing is catching up.
“Raymonds have introduced an entire range of garments made from bamboo fabrics. The shirts and trousers made from bamboo fabric possess anti-bacterial and anti-static property, they have extra capacity to retain moisture thus in the summer season the wearer would experience cool even under the scorching heat. The trousers made from bamboo fibers could be worn as formal as well as formal wear, they give the look of linen trousers which looks very elegant and fashionable.
“Raymonds also uses soybean fabrics in their trendy clothesline, as this fabric provides extra shine and moisture absorbing property. They have also introduced a fibre called Casein made from a combination of milk protein, super 120s wool, and silk. It is used for making suiting-shirtings and jackets. An international brand named BSC has launched its collection of organic towels in India.”
