H&M Foundation, the non-profit organisation, has unveiled the 10 early-stage innovations it said are “set to reshape the fashion industry – from clean tech recycling in China to community-powered circularity in Ghana”.
They’re the winers of the Global Change Award 2025, “spotlighting groundbreaking ideas aimed at decarbonising the fashion industry in a just way”.
Each winner will receive a €200,000 grant and take part in the year-long GCA Changemaker Programme designed to accelerate the industry’s journey toward net-zero and offering a mix of “innovation support, systems thinking and personal growth”.
The winners come under a variety of categories. In Responsible Production they include Thermal Cyclones from the UK whose “revolutionary industrial heat pumps can replace traditional boilers and reduce energy consumption by over 75%”; and Pulpatronics, also UK-based, whose metal-free, chipless RFID paper tags are “recyclable, cost-effective, and made with carbon-based ink”.
And from China, there’s DecoRpet, a low-temperature decolorisation process that “slashes energy use while delivering high-quality recycled PET for new textile production”.
In Sustainable Materials & Processes India’s A Blunt Story that makes Uncrude, a plastic-free sole made from bio-based and recycled materials as “a clean break from fossil-based footwear”; the UK’s Brilliant Dyes harnesses the power of cyanobacteria, with the start-up creating biodegradable dyes via a low-energy extraction method. Meanwhile Decarbonization Lab from Bangladesh is a dedicated R&D space pioneering low-emission with a focus on textile treatments and dyeing techniques “to modernise outdated industry practices”; and Sweden’s Renasens is a waterless, chemical-free technology that turns blended textile waste into raw materials with no depolymerisation and no pollution.
In Mindful Consumption, the UK’s Loom is an “intuitive tech platform that connects users with designers to upcycle unworn clothes into one-of-a-kind pieces”.
And the Wildcards category features the Revival Circularity Lab from Ghana. It’s a creative hub in Accra’s Kantamanto Market that turns textile waste into value, “empowering artisans and building local circularity”.
“To truly decarbonise fashion, we need to reimagine every part of the value chain – from how fibres are made to how garments are reused,” said Karl-Johan Persson, founder and board member of the H&M Foundation.
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