We are delighted to announce the projects that were approved in the first Future Fashion Factory innovation funding call.
From bespoke tailors to fashion brands to Yorkshire’s prestigious mills, nine projects will benefit from a combined total investment of more than £645,000 in new, industry-led research and development (R&D).
“It’s fantastic to see the range of businesses working with Future Fashion Factory in response to their first funding call,” says Dr Paul Meller, Associate Director at UKRI’s Arts and Humanities Research Council.
“These pioneering partnerships between industry and universities will drive innovation in this vibrant and rapidly expanding sector and underpin economic growth in the region.”
The successful projects focus on challenges faced by businesses across the fashion and textile industry, including:
- Abraham Moon & Sons: A digital system for enhanced accuracy and efficiency of the wool dyeing process
- Advanced Dyeing Solutions / Roaches International: A process to digitally evaluate, relay and visualise the aesthetics of textile fabrics to users in a different location
- AW Hainsworth and Yorkshire Textiles: Digitising early designs from Leeds Industrial Museum to produce a ‘new heritage’ fabric for electronic jacquard manufacture
- Deluxe Beds: Design of a modular mattress product
- Gieves & Hawkes: Reducing the lead time on a UK made-to-measure suit from 6-8 weeks to 48 hours
- Joshua Ellis: Market assessment of high value recycled cashmere products manufactured in the UK
- Laxtons: Development of immersive technology for staff training in large-scale textile production
- Whiteford Felt & Fillings: Data analytics supported market research of new outerwear product lines
- WT Johnson & Sons: Developing a new digital analysis system for quantitative prediction of the effect of selected process conditions on fabric handle and finish.
Future Fashion Factory supports projects where industry partners and researchers at our three academic centres of the University of Leeds, University of Huddersfield, and the Royal College of Art collaborate to solve real business challenges.
It is free to become a member of the partnership, and businesses of all sizes and specialisms in the UK fashion and textile sectors are welcome to join the community.
Our second innovation funding call opens to expressions of interest on 2 September 2019. If you have a project idea you would like to discuss, or would like to find out more about getting involved in the partnership, contact the Programme team.
