CEO & Founder of C.L.A.S.S. Eco Hub Giusy Bettoni, and a panel of industry experts, discussed the new frontiers of seamless technology and its applications in fashion, during a one-hour long webinar recently. Process X Progress: Unlocking the potential of seamless technology to create a Smart wardrobe, was streamed on 4 March 2021.

The panel consisted of Patrick Silva Szatkowski, Marketing Department at Santoni Spa; Asi Efros, Editor at Lingerie Briefs Magazine / Material Briefs Column; Carlos Soares, Certifications and Sustainability Processes Responsible at Impetus; and Eva de Laat and Carola Leegwater, Co-Founders at Studio Eva x Carola.

Santoni is a manufacturer of circular seamless knitting machines with more than 100 years of experience. The company’s Patrick Silva kicked off the event with details of the Brescia based machine builder’s green credentials, including a discussion about its membership of The Association of Italian Textile Machinery Manufacturers’ (ACIMIT) Green Guide, which illustrates the sustainable technologies supplied by Italian textile machinery manufacturers.

The Brescia based company’s current best-selling machine, the SM8 TOP2 V, is 30% more productive than its predecessor yet uses an astounding 50% less energy. Silva went on to discuss Santoni’s X Machine technology for one piece shoe upper production. The intarsia technique circular knitting machine knits a pair of one-piece shoe uppers in around 15 minutes, whereas a conventional shoe upper with multiple components can take as much as 120 minutes to complete.

Commenting on why seamless technology is good for a next generation wardrobe, Eva de Laat of seamlesswear design duo Eva x Carola, cited beauty, durability, an alternative to the take-make-waste industry, as factors which make Santoni technology key for sustainable production. When asked about Eva x Carola’s sustainability strategy, Eva said that everything the company does should be both smart and cradle to cradle.

Business partner and fellow designer Carola Leegwater agreed that innovation and sustainability can go together and showed detailed workings and designs for a seamlessly knitted bra which uses data driven body mapping. Another example shown was a sustainable collection for Woolmark, which Giusy Bettoni dubbed ‘eco-hi-tech’.

Watch the full webinar: Unlocking the potential of seamless technology to create a Smart wardrobe…