The start-up Losanje, winner of the Andam 2025 Fashion Innovation Award, founded by Simon Peyronnaud and Mathieu Khouri, has established itself as an important player in textile upcycling. Thanks to its proprietary technology and an integrated approach, Losanje, upcycling is economically profitable and finally scalable.
A year after our last meeting, we asked Simon Peyronnaud and Mathieu Khouri six questions to take stock of their strategy, industrial ambitions and their role in structuring the EPR textile sector.
Many companies that deal with the recycling of textiles have not yet found their business model. How do you manage to industrialize such a manual practice as upcycling?
That is a good question. In order to be profitable, Upcycling has to meet two conditions: it must be economically relevant for brands and ecologically sensible on an industrial scale. At Losanje we have developed a global approach: We not only produce, we support brands along the entire chain. With the support of our design office, our design team works closely with the customers: inside to design tailor-made products that are adapted to their upcycling project. We also support you in identifying the most relevant stocks.
Upcycling creates a triple value: an economic one by not selling defective or used products a new life is breathed in; an environmentally friendly, with a process without direct emissions; And a narrative, because every piece of clothing tells a unique story. A good example is our capsule collection with Paris basketball, which consists of old jerseys, which have been converted into lifestyle sports clothing. Result: A number of T-shirts and shorts was sold out in just one week.
Is your model more technology -based, production -based or service -based? And how far do you want to go?
Our value is mainly based on the use of our own technology. We have a significant part of the process – cutting – automated and can thus significantly reduce the unit costs. Result: The cost price of our upcycling products is comparable to that of the traditional channels.
In my opinion, what really distinguishes us is our systemic approach. There are two possible scenarios: Either a brand already has inventory that has to be rated or has no material and we then get the corresponding products, often from sorting centers.
In both cases, our design office is the focus: procurement, selection of materials, design, pattern creation, start of the cut in our own factory, then composition by partner workshops in France or in Europe. This comprehensive support justifies our leading position.
How can you standardize products from different materials and at the same time ensure industrial consistency?
It is a technical challenge that we have faced – and which we consider at the same time as a competitive advantage. Through upcycling, we can create products with a strong message that stand out in a saturated market. These pieces tell a story: that of the conversion of unsuccessful or used clothing into unique creations.
At the industrial level, we adapt: If customers deliver your own stocks inside, we work with a homogeneous material, which guarantees a standardized production. For second-hand deposits, we carry out a targeted procurement of large quantities through our committed team. Today we developed efficient lines for materials such as T-shirts, sweatshirts, jerseys and denim. This enables us to offer consistent covers in large quantities and at the same time reduce CO2 footprint by up to 95 percent.
What has the Andam innovation award changed for you? And what are your short -term investment areas?
This award comes at a strategic time. We are currently completing a new financing round that follows in 2023. This price will enable us to find faster in three important areas:
- F&E and automation: perfection of our cutting lines, development of new modules, expansion of our software solutions.
- Industrialization: We will soon move into a factory that is twice as large to expand our production.
- Team education: We hire for different positions – sales, project management, modeling, etc.
For us, the Andam Prize is also a real recognition from the fashion and clothing industry, before an extraordinary jury, which is also convinced from the outset that upcycling can be “the next big thing in fashion”.
Where exactly are you in your collaboration with large fashion and luxury brands? What quantities do you process?
We already work with several luxury brands in quantities of 5,000 to 50,000 pieces. These projects will be started between the end of 2025 and 2026 with the SS2026 or FW2025 collections. Our model made it possible to remove the technical and economic obstacles for the introduction of upcycling. The real challenge is still convincing the creative teams today. You have to show them that upcycling is not a restriction, but a real artistic lever. We are convinced that each brand will have an upcycling corner in the shop at short notice. Perhaps in a different form, with other names or business models, but Losanje will be there to build this new standard together with you.
Losanje also seems to want to play a role in the structuring of the textile sector in times of expanded manufacturer responsibility (EPR). By 2026, however, the requirements for the EPR textile sector will be completely revised, with a clear goal: to shift, sort and reuse textile waste and at the same time support innovative industrial infrastructures. What is your position on this topic?
Our goal is to play a structuring role in the textile EPR value chain. Upcycling is an emerging sector that has now reached a certain degree of maturity. With the commissioning of our first factory, we can use several hundred tons per year, with the capacity to rise to several tens of thousands of tons.
One of the greatest advantages is that there are no restrictions on the composition of the materials. In contrast to some recycling technologies, upcycling enables the recovery of heterogeneous deposits. Two second-hand jeans can become a high-quality jacket whose environmental balance of the second-hand jeans is close to.
However, so that the sector can develop fully, we have to work together on the topics of sorting, eco -modulation, labeling and regulatory framework. This work has already started with Ademe, France 2030 and in cooperation with the Circular Fashion Federation.
We are ready to build a solid sector that is both economically efficient and ecologically exemplary.
This article originally appeared on fashionunited.fr and was translated using digital tool. He was then carefully edited.