Clothes That Can Be Recycled

What is circular design to us?

There is no single industry-recognized definition of the word "recyclable" for textiles and clothing. The Primark Circular Product Standard, first launched in 2023, sets out our approach to embedding and scaling circular design within our business. It was inspired by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation vision for a circular economy for fashion. Our updated Circular Product Standard published in 2026, brings together three years of learning and collaboration in circular design, setting out a revised approach for both our business and suppliers to follow.

Our framework explains what ‘circular’ means at Primark. Circular products are designed for physical durability, to be easier to recycle at a commercial scale, and to include recycled or more sustainably sourced fibers.

The Next Phase of Circular Design at Primark

We want to keep offering great value to our customers while continuing to innovate. Our focus is on solutions that are practical, achievable, and scalable.

Today, 5% of all Primark's clothing units sold in 2024/25 are circular by design, meeting the ‘Foundational’ level criteria set out in their Circular Product Standard. Within some key categories, 20% of all jersey and 8% of all denim units of sales sold were circular by design during the 2024/25 financial year.

In our updated Circular Product Standard, we have:

• Simplified our approach based on learnings to date, introducing a refreshed framework to guide product teams in more circular design.

• Defined our ‘Progressive’ level to set clear expectations for ‘better’ design, raising the bar on materials, durability and recyclability requirements from the previous version.

• Tested and trialed the framework across different product categories, carrying out deep dives with Buyers, Designers and Quality teams, in addition to trusted suppliers, to understand what is technically possible.

• Explored printing techniques to identify more recyclable options.

Read more about our revised framework and how we apply to these principles here.

Building circular design skills in the business

We’re also training our teams and suppliers in circular design through tailored training programs.

Foundational

All current and new Product Team members at Primark take part in our ‘Foundational’ level circularity training program. We worked with Circle Economy and the Sustainable Fashion Academy to create the training modules. These training modules represent ‘circularity 101’ and help upskill our product colleagues on core circular economy principles.

Expert

In 2024, we advanced our circularity training program to ‘Expert’ level in collaboration with the Circular Textile Foundation. The program supports our Product Teams and suppliers to apply circular design principles to new clothing categories such as knitwear and shirts, alongside existing categories including jersey and denim. Our training consists of a series of workshops to help put the theory of circular design into practice and show colleagues ways to embed this into their everyday work, with a category-by-category approach.

The ultimate output of our advanced training is circular design guidelines specific to each product category. So far, we have completed guidelines for nine product categories: denim, jersey, knitwear, sleepwear, shirts, skirts, blouses, dresses and leisurewear.

Loving Clothes for Longer

Repair Workshops

We’ve created free repair workshops to help customers keep clothes in use through repair, care and upcycling, helping them to love and wear their clothes for longer. Sign up here for one of our workshops.

To keep momentum after repair workshops and inspire those who couldn’t attend, we offer online repair tutorials and shared clothing care tips on our social channels. Find out more here.

Partnering With The Seam

We’re expanding the trial of our in-store clothing repairs service with The Seam to more Primark stores across the UK high street after launching the initial pilot in Manchester last year. The service is now available at our Bromley and Edinburgh Princes Street stores, giving customers access to simple same-day repairs and alterations, alongside more complex services such as knit repairs, zip replacements and dress reshaping for the first time.

Our Textile Takeback Program

Working with our recycling partner, Yellow Octopus Circular Solutions, we provide an easy way for customers and colleagues to drop off unwanted clothing and textiles in store. Items are reused or resold where possible, and anything unsuitable is recycled. Read more here.

A product designed in line with our Circular Product Standard follows these principles:

• Designed with recycled or more sustainably sourced fibers: the main fabric is made using cotton from the Primark Cotton Project (formerly the Primark Sustainable Cotton Program) (95%) and/or recycled cotton, and/or organic cotton. 5% is made up of trims, embellishments or buttons, which are removable or recyclable where possible.

• Designed for physical durability: Product meets the wash and performance test requirements as detailed in our Durability Framework (foundational level).

• Designed to be technically recyclable at commercial scale: fabrics made from 100% cotton. Care labels and stitching thread made from 100% polyester, with essential functional trims only.

What else are we doing?

Love your clothes for longer repair workshops

For the past three years, we’ve been offering repair workshops for customers. Run in many of our stores, these workshops aim to teach people how to mend, darn, embroider, customise or upcycle their clothes. We currently offer workshops in stores in the UK, Ireland, France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands and the US.

Since these workshops aren’t available everywhere yet, we’ve also created an online customer hub with simple step-by-step videos covering everything from basic stitching to sewing on buttons and zippers.

Sign up here for one of our workshops.

Expanding our Textile Takeback program

Our Textile Takeback program is one part of our wider approach to circularity. With the help of recycling partner Yellow Octopus, we offer customers and team members a convenient way to donate unwanted clothing or textiles and give items a second life. If what's put into the takeback boxes can’t be reused or resold, the clothes or textiles will be recycled. Read more here.

Our Partnerships

Ellen MacArthur Foundation

We’ve worked with the Ellen MacArthur Foundation since 2018 as part of its "Make Fashion Circular" initiative. In 2021, we became Network Partners of the Foundation and joined its Advisory Board for Fashion. We also partnered with their Jeans Redesign Project, designing a collection of denim products that can be easily recycled. In 2024, we joined the Foundation’s the Fashion ReModel to help the industry unlock the barriers to scaling circular business models.

WRAP

We have been working with WRAP for over a decade to support our ambition to reduce textile waste and extend the life of clothes.

Primark was an early member of WRAP’s Sustainable Clothing Action Plan and is now a founding signatory of the UK Textiles Pact (previously Textiles 2030), WRAP’s industry-wide agreement to cut carbon, water and waste.

WRAP was instrumental in the development of our own Durability Framework, which was created to support our ambition to make our clothes last longer in the absence of an industry standard for physical durability.

Circular Textile Foundation

Through training with the Circular Textiles Foundation, we’re evolving our product design in a practical, step-by-step way, developing the right solutions for each product area while enabling teams to test, trial and innovate.

Read more about how we work with our partners here.

But don’t just take our word for it: hear more from our partners