delicates turning waste into romance in Heatwave Project
©delicates
delicates, a brand that advocates for a comfortable, sustainable lifestyle with white t-shirts in all sorts of patterns, launched a T-shirt upcycling Pop-up Tour in China. With the mission to "let everyone find the most suitable white T-shirt," delicates is committed to helping consumers find practical and sustainable white T-shirts.
©delicates
Launched on August 18th, delicates' sustainable recycling project, "Heatwave Project," officially made a debut in the Shanghai flagship store, encouraging consumers to bring their unwanted T-shirts for recycling.
During the event, at their flagship shop in Shanghai, delicates brought an upcycled piece of art installation inspired by climate change, in collaboration with Chinese artist Zhilin, with nearly a thousand pieces of unwanted T-shirts. The unwanted T-shirts that could have been sent to the landfills become art installations for the Chinese audience to explore and learn more about the stories behind them.
delicates also designed a series of patterns and event themes that link to the city's culture where the pop-up event was launched. Consumers who donated their unwanted T-shirts can win a limited edition of a cotton tote bag with their DIY patterns, which creates a fun and engaging way for the Chinese audience.
In addition to collaborating with artists, delicates is committed to working with brands to bring consumers more high-quality and exciting choices and provide story inspiration for creation. For instance, this September, delicates collaborated with Minions, one of China's most beloved cartoon characters. For instance, in the store, deli-sticker collections with Universal Pictures are available, and consumers can customize Minions t-shirts of their own.
©delicates
Some of the campaign highlights include:
Sustainability runs through the Campaign
©delicates
As the brand matures, the recycling program has been continuously upgraded and in place for seven years without interruption. From the execution of the latest event with the theme of "defeat the heat wave with a heat wave," it can be seen that its sustainable actions are continuously deepening, and the excitement of the visual and gameplay brought to consumers has also reached a higher level.
Based on environmental protection behavior, delicates enables consumers and brands to maintain a high frequency of interaction. In the future, there will still be a lot of market space in the field of sustainability, and this flagship campaign will bring more value recognition and consumption increment to the brand.
Collaborating with Artists and Popular IP Characters
It's a fun way to marry two brands into one fantastic experience for fans of sustainable lifestyle and fun IP alike. This co-branding partnership was a win for both parties, as minions captured more attention and got delicates shoppers (many of whom are young men/women) excited about the film's release. Besides collaborations with artists to create upcycled art pieces.
Bringing Unwanted Clothes A New Life
©delicates
For a long time, delicates have focused on the daily item of a white T-shirt and caught more people's attention in the most "simple" way. The brand hopes that everyone can find a white T-shirt that suits them and enhances their happiness in life. Regarding sustainability, delicates has always had a "recycling program" that encourages consumers to return old T-shirts to the store and buy new ones at discounted prices.
The recycled clothes will be repurposed into bags, pet supplies, or donated to stray cat and dog organizations. The two collaborations with artist Zhilin, through the beautiful installation art made from old clothes, delicates allows consumers to see another possibility of combining old clothes with creativity.
GREENEXT's Take
Every second, the equivalent of a rubbish truckload of clothes is burnt or buried in landfills. How to engage consumers to extend the life of clothing is a critical element of sustainable fashion that a lot of brands are exploring in China. For instance, Uniqlo, Zara, HM, etc., all launched clothing drive campaigns in their stores. delicates' recycling pop-up campaign is a highlight of their retail experience, which also finds a great way to communicate with local consumers on how to extend the lifecycle of a piece of T-shirt and unlock the power of textile waste through creativity via collaborations with different artists. Creating a campaign that makes consumers feel they're all contributing to a good cause and providing sharable content to engage participants to spread the word on different social media platforms is a very efficient move to interact with Chinese consumers.
At the moment, delicates is also planning to bring this project to more cities in China with their specially designed "recycling car" to engage and educate Chinese consumers on garment upcycling and eco-friendly clothing disposal. And we look forward to seeing more impact of the project in China!