The Dutch Circular Textile Industry 2026: Mapping the Frontrunners

Circular Textile Days wraps up its first day on 30 September with a session built around a question the industry doesn’t usually put on a stage: what’s the circular initiative that didn’t work?

This year’s CTD Café is themed ‘the whole truth’, an evening of honest conversation about circularity. It opens with ‘truth or dare’, an interactive warm-up where you trade truths and dares with the people around you, from naming your biggest challenge in circular textiles to convincing your neighbour of one circular idea in 30 seconds.

Michael Pfeifer (MOOT Upcycling) and Thijs Verhaar (KNITWEAR LAB) follow with ‘the best mistake we ever made’: not success stories, but honest accounts of circular initiatives that went differently than planned, what surprised them, and what they’d do differently now. Jody van der Vegte (UnravelNow) then runs ‘myth busters’, a live Mentimeter session where the audience votes true, false or it depends on statements like whether consumers are willing to pay more, or whether regulation will solve the problem. Jasmien Wynants (MASJIEN), Changemaker of the Year 2025 and Sustainability Professional of the Year 2023, closes with ‘the next reality’, a look back at the evening and forward to what’s next, and the evening ends with ‘finish the sentence’, where the audience completes the line ‘starting tomorrow, I will…’ on Mentimeter.

This CTD Café is moderated throughout by Jack Stephenson Buschman (Soul.com).