Destination department store Liberty recently launched its first own-brand ready-to-wear collection, which is also the first collection from its newly-appointed head of design, Holly Marler.

The 45-piece collection includes the brand’s signature Ianthe print and the 1950s Liberty ‘L’ design which have been worked alongside an on-trend feminine-retro vibe.

The collection comprises day and evening pieces, skirts, jackets, suits, shirts, robes and knits. For some pieces, the Liberty prints have been contrasted with plains in pattern/plain blocks, while others are a print jamboree in the retailer’s distinctive silks or Tana Lawn cotton.

It also features unfinished” elements like reversed Liberty Silk ribbon, as well as trompe l’oeil, sequin embellishment and the brands first-ever lace.

The collection has been inspired by influential female surrealist artists from the 1930s and the total unconformity and liberty of the Bloomsbury set. But there was also a 1970s edge with tiered ‘peasant’ dresses reminiscent of early Laura Ashley, focused on maxi lengths and intricate detailing.

PVH Corp has named Cheryl Abel-Hodges as the new CEO for its Calvin Klein division. Hodges, who served as group president for Calvin Klein North America and the Underwear Group at PVH, succeeds Steve Shiffman, who is leaving the company to pursue other interests.

In her new role, Abel-Hodges will report to Stefan Larsson, the recently appointed President. She has held various leadership positions since joining the organisation in 2006. As the group president of Calvin Klein North America, she helped set a strategic direction for the brand, driving a consumer-centric approach. Within the Underwear Group, she led the development of PVH’s innovative underwear platform, overseeing the design, merchandising, product development and planning for all of PVH’s underwear and women’s intimates businesses.

Last week, a Calvin Klein Inc subsidiary and G-III Apparel Group entered into a five-year licensing agreement for the design, production and distribution of Calvin Klein Jeans women’s jeans wear collections in the U.S. and Canada. In January, PVH also announced its decision to streamline the North America division besides consolidating its operations for the men’s Calvin Klein Sportswear and Calvin Klein Jeans businesses to strengthen the brand’s positioning.

Global apparel, footwear and accessories retailer VF Corporation aims to collaborate with environmental charity Redress to deliver the Redress Design Award 2019 x VF Challenge in Hong Kong. The collaboration will provide 10 shortlisted emerging designers an opportunity to learn from one of the world’s foremost leaders in apparel and footwear.

The award is the world’s largest sustainable fashion design competition and aims to educate emerging fashion designers across the world about sustainable design techniques.

The collaboration is supported by financial contributions from VF and charitable grants from the VF Foundation, a private philanthropic foundation funded by VF Corporation.

Designers will present their collections on September 5, 2019 at the live Grand Final at Centrestage in Hong Kong.

Polygenta Technology has launched a new technology to convert used PET bottles into polyester filament yarn. The company, which has a capacity to convert 30 tonne of PET bottles into yarn every day, plans to scale up capacity to around 100 tonne a day in the next two years.

The yarn produced by Polygenta is currently sent to Adidas’ manufacturing centres to be converted into sportswear. In future, it may also be used to upcycle clothes made from polyester yarn.

According to the United Nations, around 300 million tonne of plastic is produced every year — roughly the weight of the entire human population. Of this, eight million tonne of plastic waste ends up in the oceans; PET bottles are the main contributors to plastic waste globally and in India.

Bangladesh has emerged as the top exporter of cotton trousers to the US market with US $ 886.52 million worth of shipment, while China slipped to the second place with US $ 869.51 million export value. In the corresponding period of the prior year, Bangladesh stood at US $ 783.71 million, whereas China stayed far ahead of Bangladesh and shipped trousers valued at US $ 941.11 million.

Bangladesh shipped 15.53 dozen of cotton trousers to USA, marking 7.73 per cent surge on Y-o-Y basis. The country significantly kept its unit prices (US $ 57.07 per dozen) lower than other Asian manufacturing destinations except Indonesia (in top 10 tally) whose unit prices were US $ 51.14 per dozen. Despite offering the lowest unit prices, Indonesia dwindled by 6.90 per cent to ship US $ 196.48 million as compared to US $ 211.04 million in the same period of last year.

India, in the review period, grew by 5.05 per cent in its cotton trousers export to USA and valued at US $ 134.12 million. Despite growth coming in, India stood at 8th rank which is not in sync with India’s reputation considering the country is traditionally rich in cotton. Countries like Pakistan and Cambodia are ahead of India with US $ 163.94 million (up 4.43 per cent) and US $ 144.12 million (up 4 per cent), respectively.

Cotton Egypt Association (CEA), the non-profit which supports the Egyptian Cotton brand, has launched an initiative to root out counterfeiters in the textile industry and will name and shame the manufacturers found to be falsely advertising stock under the brand name.

CEA is committed to ensuring the authenticity of its luxury cotton and to do so wants to eradicate cases of counterfeiting, an issue that is rife in the textiles industry. It will clamp down on the wide-scale problem with threats of naming and shaming those firms who fail the rigorous accreditation scheme via a Black List on its website.

The non-profit plans to use secret shoppers both in-store and online to identify products which purport to use Egyptian Cotton, this will then be handed over to CEA and its partner, testing and verification body Bureau Veritas, which will conduct testing to validate the authenticity of a product.

Those found to be in possession of dubious stock, like a Pakistani towel manufacturer which has recently had its licence suspended off the back of being found out, will be named and shamed as to deter companies from engaging in such practices, it also raises awareness to customers and consumers that a company isn’t to be trusted.

A high-level breakout session led by ZDHC Foundation, at the forthcoming Planet Textile Summit on at ITMA 2019 in Barcelona, will provide advice and practical examples of how to eliminate the discharge of hazardous chemicals from textile production.

The ZDHC session at Planet Textiles 2019 at ITMA – along with the CEO session on chemical management – will be a perfect platform to roll out these new initiatives for the industry and also, to get immediate feedback.

The session will give the industry a practical, yet broad overview of how working closely with the ZDHC can help to tackle this problem and how textile suppliers and brands can meet tougher consumer and regulatory expectations.

The discussion will include the next steps forward by the ZDHC. This will include discussion on whether real-world progress can be made by the industry before the end of the 2020 Detox deadline to ensure that the world’s largest environmental pressure group does not come piling back into the industry.

The Bangladesh readymade garments industry has received the highest cash incentive of 5 per cent in the budget for fiscal 2019-20. While four RMG sectors get a 4 per cent cash incentive for exports to non-traditional markets, a generalised 1 per cent has been proposed for all.

Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal has proposed an export incentive of 1 percent in the next fiscal to the rest of the sectors of ready-made garments. Now, exports to traditional markets will fetch a cash incentive of 1 per cent, and to non-traditional markets will earn an incentive of 5 per cent.

The existing tax rates for the readymade garments sector will remain the same. Currently RMG in Bangladesh are taxed at 12 per cent. The rate is 10 per cent in case of a green building certification , while for the textile sector it is 15 per cent.

The tax rates have been unchanged as these sectors have boosted the exports considerably besides generating lot of employment in the country.

The government has withdrawn the ban on export of certain categories of raw jute, including uncut Bangla tossa rejection (BTR) and Bangla white rejection (BWR). The textiles and jute ministry issued a circular in this regard on May 29 this year under the section 13 of the Jute Ordinance 2017.

On January 18 last year, the government had imposed a ban on the export of uncut BTR and BWR varieties of jute for an indefinite period in response to the requests by the local industries for ensuring quality jute. However, the Bangladesh Jute Association (BJA) demanded a withdrawal of this ban. Traders, farmers and workers also expressed concern as they faced a lot of financial losses due to the ban.

According to Export Promotion Bureau, the export of jute and jute goods declined by 19.99 percent year-on-year to $773.57 million during the July-May period of the current fiscal year. The sector’s earnings declined mainly due to higher use of jute goods like sacks in the domestic market and the anti-dumping duty slapped on it by India.

The China Cotton Association (CCA) will request the US government to waive off the import duties on uncombed cotton from the United States. The Ministry of Finance posted a list of goods, including cotton that has not been carded or combed, at the end of May that could be eligible for waivers on tariffs that China imposed in July on U.S. goods as part of the China-U.S. trade war.

China is a major importer of cotton from the U.S. and tariffs of 25 per cent implemented on imports last year have significantly reduced that trade. In the first half of the 2018/19 marketing year, China imported only 11 per cent of its cotton from the United States, a decline from the 45 per cent imported in the same period in the previous marketing year.