Second Chances: Design to Extend Clothing Lifespan with a Circular Approach

The fashion industry is one of the world's most polluting sectors, disposing of 92 million tons of textile waste annually, through landfilling or incineration. This research aims to address this issue by proposing a design with a circular approach to reduce clothing waste. The main question is how to increase the lifespan of clothing. Employing a combination of library and field research methods, it was found: 1) Slowing down the product life-cycle is a key strategy for reducing waste. 2) A significant amount of clothing is still usable when discarded. 3) Iran lacks a systematic and reliable solution for safe clothing disposal. 4) The youth are willing to exchange clothing with each other, due to a cultural shift. As a state-of-the-art contribution, a conceptual model was developed to address the research question and design solutions. Subsequently, a mobile phone application was presented to help people take better care of their clothing and facilitate swapping. To explore the application's profitability, a business model was also proposed.