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Leggings made out of discarded fish nets: north east man launches sustainable fashion brand

Rory Leigh, founder of sustainable clothing brand Ghillied

A new sustainable clothing brand which sees leggings made from recycled fish nets has launched in the north-east.

Rory Leigh came up with the idea for his brand, Ghillied, during lockdown.

The UK-manufactured leggings are hand made from ultra-modern sustainable materials created from recycled fishing nets and other nylon waste including old carpet.

The fibres are sorted, cleaned and purified to a level that they can be remanufactured into clothes – with the recycled nylon fabric the base material for all Ghillied products.

Mr Leigh said: “It was lockdown project when I was furloughed last year so it’s been on-going for a long time.

“The fashion industry is something that’s completely new to me and I didn’t realise at the start how much work goes into learning how the industry works.

“There was lots of work behind the scenes in getting the product right.”

Carbon footprint kept to minimum

More than 640,000 tonnes of “ghost” fishing nets are abandoned in the oceans each year causing the death of thousands of animals.

The company’s leggings are manufactured at a London factory with waste and energy efficient machinery, in an effort to keep their carbon footprint to a minimum.

It is estimated that keeping their production in the UK saves around 115,000 tonnes of CO2 with each batch of production.

This is the equivalent of powering 168 homes for 1 month.

Mr Leigh said: “When we originally started we were speaking to factories overseas.

“There was one in China we spoke to initially but we thought with a sustainable brand it really needs to be UK-based.

“I think that was the right decision to make in the end because the quality of the product we were getting in the UK was head and shoulders above anyone else.

“It’s quite amazing what they do with the material and it really fits with our story line.

“They basically collect up old fishing nets, carpet samples industrial plastic waste and they melt the material down so it’s the original fibres and they then purify the material and repurpose them into clothes.”

“When we initially got the samples through the quality of the material was a lot better than what we were expecting.”

Setting a benchmark

Further down the supply chain, the packaging Ghillied uses comes without hang tags and uses biodegradable mailer bags to further reduce waste.

Mr Leigh said: “There is no more important time than now to reduce the impact of fast fashion.

“We are proud to work with our suppliers to deliver a traceable and sustainable product to our customers that helps to repurpose waste and reduce its impact on the environment.

“As a new business, we want to begin setting a benchmark from the start for what a sustainable brand in our industry should look like.

“We are driving a simple message – ‘buy less, choose better, make it last’”.

Expanding the range of products

The company, which is based in both Aberdeen and Edinburgh, launched in September and Mr Leigh has been pleased with the response so far and is already looking at expanding the product range.

He said: “It’s been really positive and we’ve had lots of people reaching out saying the brand is very well thought of and Scottish to its roots.”

“We’ve got some feedback for a new range of products. Leggings with pockets and logos in different places.

“The market itself is different to what we were expecting. We were expecting more of a younger generation but it’s actually been older generation which has given us the best feedback.

“Eventually we are hoping to have a collection for ladies and men.

“We want the brand to be positioned as a stylish alternatives to others that are available for outdoors.”