Fashion from scrap
Cambodia’s first zero-waste fashion labelProbably the most beautiful recycling project in the world: How a small ethical fashion label from Cambodia has created jobs, produced appealing clothing, and made money – all from scraps alone. Read More
tonlé
Probably one of the most beautiful recycling project in the world: the tonlé ethical fashion label from Cambodia has created jobs, produced appealing clothing, and made money – all from scraps alone.
Who would guess that it is ultimately all about beautiful fashion when the design team from the Cambodian tonlé label once again dives headlong into the remnant material markets of Phnom Penh to scavenge through piles of factory castoffs. Scraps that would normally be thrown away by large manufacturers serve as tonlé’s main production material. The end result: beautiful, exceptional clothing for an airy summer’s day at the sea, a stylish evening out, or a day at the office.
The joyfully colourful clothes are produced socially and ecologically fairly, yet still hardly more expensive than those of ordinary fashion labels. “We have a vision that it is possible to make clothing ethically that you want to pull out of your closet and wear every day”, explains US American founder and fashion designer Rachel Faller.
Rachel first came to Cambodia in 2008 on a Fulbright Scholarship to study fair trade in the textile industry. She was astonished by the tons of waste cast off by the large garment factories, and struck by the huge need for safe and fair jobs. “I came to realize that there was a disconnect between the products being made and what the international market demanded,” she explains. So she soon decided to found her own label to change this.
Scraps that would normally be thrown away by large manufacturers serve as tonlé’s main production material.
tonlé Autumn/Winter 2014 collection ©tonlé At KeoK'jay, later rebranded to tonlé, employees receive well above the minimum wage and have annual and sick leave. Rather than working on assembly lines, they work by hand in small groups. The greatest innovation from the tonlé team though is something else entirely – and the reason employees regularly rummage through the castoff waste produced by the large companies: Its unique zero-waste design process.
tonlé claims to have brought their waste down to 0% with this method. - See more at: www.tea-after-twelve.com/index.php
tonlé claims to have brought their waste down to 0% with this method. - See more at: www.tea-after-twelve.com/index.php
Making fashion out of strips of cloth
Zero-waste fashion production itself is not a new idea – there are plenty of technologies out there already. Several labels are either experimenting with developing creative patterns that use all the parts of a given material or with generating new garments from remnant materials.
But tonlé has invented its own method that combines both options. It works without any sophisticated technological inventions and is itself also “handmade“. The secret lies in the strips of cloth and the following four steps:
1. The discarded jersey material from the remnant markets makes up 90% of the materials used by tonlé; only 10% are bought from local and sustainable suppliers. Therefore the designs depend heavily on the available fabric. Designers and the production team start to plan the upcoming collection only after the cloth has been purchased. While creating the perfect look, they also make sure to find a way to use every single piece of fabric.
2. After the larger pieces have been cut out, tonlé employees cut the remaining cloth into strips. These strips serve as decorative elements, so it should come as no surprise that stripes are a reoccurring design element in tonlé collections.
tonlé claims to have brought their waste down to 0% with this method.
The smallest scraps are mixed in with recycled office paper and sticky rice and used for the hangtags. ©tonlé 
tonlé Autumn/Winter 2015 collection ©tonlé 3. Now comes the recycling part: The remaining pieces are sewn back into yarn, which is then knit and woven into new pieces.
4. And finally, the smallest scraps – which amount to about 2-3% of the original material – are mixed in with recycled office paper and sticky rice and used for the hangtags.
While most huge textile factories waste 40% of their fabric, tonlé claims to have brought their waste down to 0% with this method. “It took years of creative problem solving through trial and error,” Rachel recalls. “The idea to sew leftovers into yarn, for instance, brought our waste down to 2-3%, but we weren’t satisfied. In an effort to use our office paper scraps and these tiny loose threads, we came up with a recipe to make our own handmade paper.”
Entering the market
Despite the fact that tonlé pays its employees higher salaries than most other textile factories, the clothes aren’t more expensive than those of other labels. This is possible because of the cheap remnant materials used, the in-house production, and a supply chain that tries to avoid integrating too many middlemen. “We believe that ‘fair trade’ should include fair prices for our customers,” Rachel says. “Our goal is to make our clothing accessible to anyone who wants to participate in a more dignified global economy.”
“Our goal is to make our clothing accessible to anyone who wants to participate in a more dignified global economy.”
Today, 35 employees work for tonlé. The label started off with two boutiques in Cambodia in 2013 and can now count on international stockists in Vietnam, Australia, the US, Canada and several European countries. A successful crowdfunding campaign that ended in 2014 allowed the company to enter the market in the USA and Australia, and sales have since gone global. “We’ve grown so much in just a year that we have high hopes for the next ten,” Rachel says. “We hope to be in major retailers across the globe, and we plan to partner with larger brands and factories.”
