Madewell’s latest collection is made with approximately 20,000 pairs of post-consumer jeans.
On Wednesday, the J.Crew Group, Inc.-owned brand launched the Madewell x Re&Up x Isko collection—a line of online-exclusive jeans made with fabrics containing recycled cotton derived from jeans collected through its Denim Trade Up program.
As the first brand to offer year-round denim recycling through the program, Madewell has operated its denim trade-in initiative for more than a decade, giving worn denim a new life.
The jeans were recycled by Sanko Group-owned textile-to-textile recycler Re&Up. The company’s proprietary process can handle diverse polycotton blends, turning them into a “raw canvas” for new production. The resulting fibers were provided to Re&Up’s sister company, Isko, where they were woven into Global Recycled Standard (GRS) certified fabrics.
The Madewell x Re&Up x Isko collection includes three jeans. The Longline Straight Jean is made of 71 percent recycled cotton, 24 percent viscose, 4 percent recycled polyester and 1 percent elastane. The Darted Barrel-Leg Jean contains with 75 percent recycled cotton and 25 percent viscose. The Wide-Leg Jean features 71 percent recycled cotton, 23 percent viscose, 4 percent recycled polyster and 2 percent elastane. Each style retails for $158.
The collection demonstrates how complex denim waste can be re-engineered into premium fabrics, maintaining the performance, comfort and aesthetics expected by today’s consumers, while offering a scalable model for circular production.
“Closing the loop on post-consumer denim requires industrial precision,” said Marco Lucietti, Re&Up head of global marketing and communications. “Our collaboration with Madewell and Isko demonstrates that we can deconstruct complex, worn garments and re-integrate them into the supply chain as high-quality next-gen cotton and polyester. This is a blueprint for how brands can utilize their own take-back streams to create a repeatable, closed-loop production cycle.”
Madewell and Isko frequently collaborate on sustainable denim. The duo teamed up in 2022 to create the first pair of jeans made from Isko’s Bluesign-approved fabrics. The brand also tapped Isko’s Creative Room for a special collection.
