Orta has partnered with Biodesign Challenge which tasks teams from top design schools to create denim products, imagine alternative raw materials, and rethink processes using biotechnology. Denim brand Orta pursues sustainable lifestyles and production. The aim is to create a more robust denim ecosystem where art meets technology meets ethics, for new infinite possibilities of denim today and tomorrow.
By partnering design students with top-tier scientists, the challenge will provide a new platform for envisioning positive and transformational applications for sustainable denim manufacturing, and alternatives to cotton and other natural fibers. The Orta prize for bioinspired textiles processes will be awarded to the team that explores sustainability in the fabrication and treatment of textiles. The challenge asks teams to consider how living processes fit into textile lifecycles, alternative fibers and production. Students will consider how their manufacturing and application affects users, ecosystems, and the environment.
The winning global teams of the Biodesign Challenge will showcase their design models at the Biodesign Summit in New York in front of academic, industrial and design representatives. Awareness about issues around sustainability and ethics is becoming a key concern for many in their apparel purchases—especially for millennials and younger consumers whose purchasing decisions are becoming more discerning.
