Lanificio Europa presented its latest fabric innovations at this week’s Munich Fabric Start, representing Tuscan culture and heritage. Established in Prato in 1966, the company specialises in the production of cotton stretch fabrics, including super stretch for casual and sportswear, embroidered and printed, denim, yarn dyes and jacquards.

All 100% made in Italy, using fully transparent and traceable production processes to guarantee ethical and responsible production, the fabrics are certified by Eurocontrol and by Oeko-Tex Standard 100 Certification. As of March 2016, Lanificio Europa signed the Detox Commitment with Greenpeace, joining the CID (Consorzio Implementazione Detox).

“The CID Consortium team continues to mobilise the global textiles industry to raise awareness and activate change among the multinational producers of dyestuff to embark on a path of improvement toward the removal of many chemical substances. The CID has increased the competences of fashion systems in Prato and now beyond,” the company reports.

Europa selects premium innovative smart raw materials to produce responsible stretch denim. Europa internally prepares its own stretch yarn to combine sustainable Roica yarns by Asahi Kasei with Newlife, a High-Tech Conversion Model that transforms fully traceable post-consumer plastic bottles into a high-tech polymer using a mechanical process entirely made in Italy, therefore, obtaining a smart yarn entirely made of GRS certified materials. The company’s goal is to achieve 70-80% of the collection with sustainable stretch yarn with Roica Eco-Smart family.

This season, Europa has developed a beautiful stretch denim with 10% cashmere, while some stretch denim contains at least 33% of processed wool treated with an internally developed finishing that makes the denim stable in size.

The processes used by Lanificio Europa in the production of its fabrics include:

• 3twist, an exclusive twisting system that is said to guarantee perfect form after washing, a permanent wearability and a full recovery of product shape
• Relax finishing, a luxury treatment that relaxes the fabric naturally and preserves its purity and integrity
• pro.care, a special finishing process to make fabric softer, delicate and resistant, crease-free and guarantees perfect fit and recovery after wash

All the fabrics are subjected to visual inspection and provided with a quality control certificate indicating length, width variation, cuttable width, flaws map. Europa’s approach to a circular economy and zero waste includes using its weaving and throwsting leftovers; the white scraps are transformed into wicks for household cleaning products and remaining materials are used to produce nonwoven batting.

www.laneuropa.it