The Hong Kong Research Institute of Textiles and Apparel (HKRITA)’s critically acclaimed project, the Garment-to-Garment Recycling System (G2G) has swept up two more prestigious international design awards: the Gold Award of the IF Design Award 2022 in the Retail/Sales category in mid-April and the Good Design Awards 2021 (Retail Fitting) of The Chicago Athenaeum in December 2021.

The iF Design Award is one of the most prestigious design awards in Germany and this year attracted nearly 11,000 submissions from all over the world to this highly respected competition. Of the many submissions, only 73 finally obtained a Gold Award. To achieve this level of recognition, a submission must excel in terms of conceptualization, form, function, differentiation and impact. G2G’s zero water use was commended as a sustainable upcycling solution. “This ingenious system opens up the prospect of ad-hoc and on-site-recycling systems in a variety of locations,” the jury noted.

The G2G also won the Good Design Awards 2021 in the Retail Fitting category. Organized by The Chicago Athenaeum, an International Museum of Architecture and Design, this competition received over 1,100 submissions from more than 50 nations.

Set up as a mini-factory at The Mills, a modern retail space in Hong Kong in 2018, the G2G is the world’s first post-consumer garment recycling system that operates in a retail space. It is a textile recycling line installed in a 40-foot container and enclosed in double glazing, which permits direct observation of the process that upcycles post-consumer clothes into clean and wearable new garments.