DENIM CITY SP WANTS TO CONNECT THE MARKET AND PROMOTE INNOVATION ALLIED WITH SUSTAINABILITY
Project founded in Amsterdam gets a Brazilian version installed in the traditional distric of Brás, in São Paulo.
Of Dutch origin, Denim City landed in São Paulo in October 2020 during the pandemic, with the proposal to connect several points in the jeans production chain and create a hub of innovation, sustainability and technology initiatives. The brand is the result of the initiative of a group of entrepreneurs who sought this business model in Amsterdam to strengthen the Brazilian industry, opening the second (and largest) Denim City in the world around here.
The Brazilian version of the project brings together under one roof some of the main agents of the jeans industry in a restored warehouse with an impressive 4,800 square meters in the Brás neighborhood, traditional for bringing together hundreds of garments. The space brings together showrooms, auditorium, co-working, three restaurants and a concept store, bringing together some premium jeans brands, including Blue&Cool, a neo-brand that emerged together with Denim City. In addition, the space also houses the Denim City Academy, a mix of a school and a jeans workshop designed to disseminate technical knowledge in the production of jeans and the most innovative technologies on the market.
Brazil has an important track record in jeanswear. In the 1990s, the market experienced a boom in jeans brands led by brands such as Zoomp, Fórum and Ellus. Over the years, the direction of this market has changed and national jeans are no longer the jeans most desired by consumers, who migrated to Italian, Japanese and Dutch brands (the new pole of the world's jeans). For Maria José Orione, a professional with years of expertise in the jeans sector and current academic director of Denim City São Paulo, what is currently lacking in the jeans brand market in Brazil is investment in branding, confidence in the DNA of its own brands, professionalization of sector and, above all, to abandon the vicious cycle of price and start a virtuous cycle of creativity and sustainability.
Currently, the production of jeans is around 350 million pieces per year, headed by more than 6 thousand companies and 300 brands that share most of the market. Jeans production in Brazil is equivalent to 15% of total sales in this market. On the other hand, the production of jeans is also one of the most polluting sectors in fashion, hence the need for initiatives that seek to create the jeans of the future, less polluting and more sustainable.
“The denim industries (fabric from which jeans are made) in Brazil are large and solid companies and all of them work very responsibly in terms of sustainability with ETE's (Effluent Treatment Stations) treating and returning water in relatively better conditions. to abstracted water, with reuse of water and generation of heat from renewable sources, using modern and healthy chemicals and most of all signatories of the ZDHC program (Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals – Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals) a Road Map to guide value chains towards the safer use of chemicals, towards a cleaner planet and a better future” tells us Maria José.
However, sustainability is not yet a maxim in the jeans industry: “As we move along the chain towards retail, the size of companies is decreasing and the awareness of the need for clean and sustainable production is diluted, which is why we of DCSP we are working with the project partners to, through education and awareness, lead the chain 'towards a brighter blue'”.
Denim City São Paulo is an open space for visitors and more information about the courses and how the space works can be found on the project's website (www.denimcity.org.br).
