The Origins Story

Late one night during a PhD in green chemistry, a documentary on fast fashion raised an obvious question: PET bottles are recyclable, PET clothing is not. The chemistry is identical.

The answer came from the soft drinks industry. Seven Up turned clear because colour destroys the value of recycled PET. For bottles, the fix was simple. For textiles, nobody had solved it.

So DyeRecycle founder Aida Rafat founder bought a £2 charity shop Christmas blanket — Santa's face and all — and dipped it into a row of lab solvents. Certain solvents stripped the dye selectively, leaving the PET fibre clean. The colour came out. The plastic stayed.

That was the moment DyeRecycle began.