New M&S menswear suit crafted with recycled wool

The lightweight, single breasted suit is available online and instore at £149. Customers can choose from five colours, including charcoal, blue, navy, neutral and green, while M&S has confirmed a three-piece option is also available.

The suits will be made with wool that M&S customers have donated through the retailer’s Shwopping clothes recycling scheme with Oxfam. The wool is woven into the suit fabric at Nova Fides – a family-run mill based in Prato, Italy – where it is then fashioned into the ‘Shwop’ suit, M&S said.

M&S ambassador of tailoring David Gandy expressed confidence that the suit would “stand the test of time”, and “retain its shape and colour through the years”.

“As my new role as ambassador of tailoring at M&S, I’m proud to talk about the fact that 80% of the new tailoring collection will be made with wool,” Gandy said. “My favourite item this season is actually made with recycled wool that uses items donated through our Shwopping initiative.”

Schwop succes

The suit has been crafted as part of the M&S Plan A 2025 sustainability initiative, which has seen the retailer commit to a quarter of its clothing and home products being made using at least 25% recycled materials.

It comes after this summer’s launch of a men’s jeans range produced using five time less water than conventional methods, as well as having a reduced energy and chemical footprints.

Plan A has saved more than £750m for M&S and has seen more than 27 million items of clothing “shwopped” since 2008. 

M&S has also taken steps with its cotton target to source 100% of cotton from sustainable sources by 2019. The retailer teamed with other corporates and Forum for the Future to convene a new cross-industry initiative, Cotton 2040, aimed at turning sustainable cotton into a mainstream commodity.

George Ogleby