9 European institutions come together to train young people in the textile sector in sustainability and digitalisation
- The 9 entities represent the triple helix of innovation made up of universities, training schools and business associations
- The project is co-financed by the Erasmus+ program of the European Union
The European textile and fashion industry is currently facing significant structural and systemic challenges that require a profound changing model. The new European regulatory framework foresees a more efficient management of textile waste that will also force the development of circularity in the textile and fashion industry in Europe, as well as the acceleration of the digitization of the sector’s design, industrial and commercial processes after the pandemic. These challenges draw a new competitive framework to which companies in the sector must adapt. The textile and fashion industry, which employs 1.3 million people in Europe and generates an aggregate turnover of 143 billion Euros, comprises more than 140,000 SMEs, the majority small, that need support in addressing the transformation process in which the sector is immersed.
This is why higher education has launched the TRANSITIONS project, a strategic alliance for innovation, which aims to create a collaborative environment in which market, as well as textile and design professional needs, can be detected and thus develop new training methods to face the current digital and sustainable transformation.
On the 5th and 6th of September, all members of TRANSITIONS met in Barcelona, at the headquarters of the Fundació Elisava (Barcelona), which leads this project, to start the execution of the project’s activities and to promote the ways of collaboration among the different participating entities. The workdays also included visits to fashion brands such as the Munich footwear company and the Institute of Advanced Architecture of Catalonia facilities to learn about some of their most prominent projects related to the textile industry.
Those responsible for this new alliance are confident that the project’s results will contribute to offering new training alternatives oriented to the sector’s transformation needs and based on a multidisciplinary approach that guarantees the diversity of entities linked to TRANSITIONS.
The agenda for the Kick-Off meeting was as follows:
Monday 5th of September
- Institutional welcome & agenda presentation
- Sectorial challenges and opportunities of the action
- WP1. Project visualisation
- WP2. Workshop on research and data
- WP3. Workshop on technology and sustianability
- Study visits at Munich Sports, FabLab and Fabricademy
Tuesday 6th of September
- WP4. Workshop on curriculum design
- WP5. Transitions Labs design
- WP6. Communication strategy
- WP1. Management final remarks
