Partnering with Deakin University

We’re partnering with Deakin University to give unwanted textiles a new future

Clothing that can no longer be worn or resold can still contain valuable materials. Through our partnership with Deakin University’s Recycling and Clean Energy Commercialisation Hub (REACH), we’re exploring how those materials can be recovered and made into new textile products.

Funded through the Australian Government’s Trailblazer Universities Program, the project combines Salvos Stores’ expertise in textile collection and recovery with Deakin’s research and advanced manufacturing capabilities. Together, we’re working to better understand recovered fibres, test their potential and develop new pathways to keep textiles in circulation.

From unwanted clothing to recovered fibre

Our Textile Recovery Facility (TRF) in Queensland provides a vital link between unwanted clothing and textile recycling. Its technology sorts garments by fibre type and colour and automatically removes buttons and zips, preparing cleaner streams of material for recycling without manual decommissioning.

Through Deakin’s Institute for Frontier Materials, the research is helping optimise textile recovery and investigate how to preserve the length and quality of recycled fibres. This is an important step towards recovering fibres suitable for making new clothing and other textile products.

Testing what recovered textiles could become

A key part of the partnership is access to Deakin’s Future Fibres Facility, where recovered materials can be taken through the manufacturing process, from fibre to yarn and finished textile products.

This pilot-scale capability allows researchers and industry partners to test different textile streams, explore potential applications and develop product demonstrations before investing in larger-scale production.

For Salvos Stores, it connects the materials we recover with the research and manufacturing expertise needed to understand what they could become.