Closed Loop Fashion recently participated in two closed-door Leadership Roundtables during the Global Fashion Summit: Copenhagen Edition 2025. Both sessions focused on advancing circular approaches to textile waste, bringing together key industry stakeholders for practical, solution-oriented discussions. The Summit, held under the theme Barriers and Bridges, provided a space to reflect on current challenges and opportunities within the fashion sector’s sustainability transition.
One of the sessions where Closed Loop Fashion played a central role was the Global Circular Fashion Forum (GCFF) Steering Committee meeting. As part of the GCFF’s core group of partners, we engaged in shaping the platform’s direction and refining the strategic steps needed to accelerate circularity in key production regions. The discussion centered around aligning policy efforts, strengthening local ecosystems, and identifying practical solutions that can drive long-term, system-wide change. It was a powerful reminder of how collaboration across borders and sectors is essential to push the industry forward.
Another highlight of the Summit was the closed-door roundtable focused on Vietnam and Cambodia, where Marina Chahboune, founder of Closed Loop Fashion, was invited to present. The roundtable brought together diverse participants from across the textile supply chain, including recyclers, global development agencies, brands, NGOs, circular business solution providers, and manufacturers. The conversation explored the critical role of post-industrial textile waste aggregators in producing countries for enabling recycling ecosystems and circularity in supply chains. Participants openly discussed the challenges of the currently mainly informal waste sector, barriers to access waste, the Commercial Reality of Formalization and how this stakeholder group could be integrated meaningfully into future supply chain planning.
Drawing on our active work in the region, Closed Loop Fashion shared real examples of how inclusive value chain models and local engagement can create more resilient circular systems. The session was particularly timely in light of the growing investment interest of textile-to-textile recyclers in Vietnam and other Southeast Asian countries, making it clear that circularity must be a central part of the country’s textile development journey moving forward.
Participating in these two roundtables was an important moment for us. They reflected the importance of making space for nuanced, solutions-driven dialogue and for bringing the voices of those who often sit at the margins of the value chain into the center of the conversation.
