Projects - ongoing

THREADs (2024-2027): Led by Kajaani University of Applied Sciences in Finland, THREADs ("Textile and Habiliment Reuse for the Environment and NPA Area Development") is an INTERREG funded collaboration including the Municipality of Kittilä, Kiertokaari Ltd (Finland), Boras University, Lulea Miljoresurs AB (Sweden), Western Development Commission and Technological University of the Shannon (Ireland), Remiks Husholdning AS (Norway) and the Icelandic Textile Center. The project focuses on a new approach to textile waste management, as well as educating and innovating at the design and post-consumer phase. Target groups are waste management stakeholders, consumers, designers, craftspeople, educators, disadvantaged groups and social enterprises. 

The Icelandic Textile Center will participate in data collection regarding textile waste, waste collection and usage in Iceland, organize outreach events and workshops to educate makers with the skills and resources to re-imagine, design and re-craft textile resources ("From Design to Disposal"). The kick-off meeting will be held in Iceland in October 2024. 

Tracks4Crafts 2023-2026: a Horizon 2022 funded, four-year European collaboration set to examine and transform the transmission of traditional crafts knowledge. In today’s world, crafts are valued as traditions, as heritage, but they sit uneasily in an economic environment focused on high-tech and mass-production. The main aim of the project is to revive, validate and valorise crafts. Sixteen partners including the University of Antwerpen, University Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne, the Association of European Open Air Museums and World Crafts Council Europe will collaborate to identify and test alternative formats of knowhow transmission (both in physical spaces and with new digital technologies), business models to bring traditional crafts knowledge to the market, boosting  entrepreneurship, and developing tools for applying legal regulation and certification. A selection of pilot cases, including the Textile Center, are at the centre of Tracks4Crafts. The Kick-Off meeting was held in Antwerpen from March 24-26, 2023.; in November 2023, the Consortium met for a work meeting in Florence, Italy.  www.tracks4crafts.eu

Fjólublár: The project "PurpleBlue" is a collaboration of the Textile Center of Iceland, Biopol in Skagaströnd and Ístex. The goal is to create a sustainable dyeing process for Icelandic wool and focuses on purple dye production from the bacterium Janthinobacterium lividum. The project seeks to refine the conditions for the bacteria to produce purple shades by using various waste materials as a base for the bacteria to grow, and ensure an environmentally sustainable production of dye for textile dyeing. The project received funding from the SSNV 2023 Development Fund.

„TextileCluster“: In 2021, the Textile Center received a Lóa - Innovation grant to develop a TextileCluster in Iceland and strengthen collaboration within textiles. The first meeting with representatives from schools, textile businesses and institutions was held in January 2022.