Textile Insight

T here's a first time for everything, and this time it was the first ever Virtual Lab Tour offered by Gore-Tex Brand. e event gave the media a peek at Gore's capabilities to develop and evaluate performance across categories from garments and footwear to gloves with virtual stops at the company's labs housed at the company's Newark, DE site. roughout the virtual visit it became clear that while immediate results and measurements are valuable, testing is really about constant iteration and trying to simulate years of wear. e November aernoon digital gathering also served to highlight ePE, an expanded polyethylene with high performing durability, a low carbon impact that is lighter in weight than traditional Gore-Tex waterproof membranes that was introduced a year ago. e product is making its debut this season in collections by adidas, Patagonia, Arc'teryx, Salomon and others. "ePE is very much tied to Gore's heritage and its future," commented Matt Decker, global technical leader for consumer Gore-Tex business. Durability has been a key focus for Gore in recent years and lab director, Kenny Raughley, explained how testing equipment measures waterproofness in multiple ways: care, wear and environment. In terms of care, he mentioned a new Quickwash machine that uses only 1.3 gallons of water and does accelerated washing. He also noted a MTS Tester that can program any type of mechanical stretch – with up to 200-300 pulls on the fabric at a time. Ray Davis is the director of the Biophysical Lab, which is a rebrand of the company's Comfort Lab that launched 20 years ago. He made the point that comfort covers a lot of factors, everything from acoustics to tactility gets tested. For example, materials are measured for stiffness to get a "soness rating," and also tested to learn how "loud" a noise a material makes for humans to hear, but animals too – something hunters and backcountry adventurers can appreciate. e Environmental Chamber has the ability to mimic 95 percent of types of environmental conditions within this space. Weather can be a cloudless day at high noon, or a cool morning with winds up to 30 mph. "To really understand comfort, you need to test all real-world variables," said Davis. "ese days you can't de-couple sustainability and durability," said Decker. "You want to offer the best balance of comfort and durable protection for the specific end use of the product." n J uan Cutina has joined OrthoLite Cirql as its new sales director. He is based in Ho Chi Minh City and will work in tandem with the global OrthoLite sales organization to execute the adoption of Cirql with the leading global footwear brands. The company announced that Cutina is tasked with supporting global brand nominations for Cirql in collaboration with the brand Liaison Offices, the Development and Material Sourcing Teams, and also with their respective T1 factory partners. In a global team effort, Cutina will help activate strategic business relations driving the industry towards circularity. Cutina comes aboard the OrthoLite Cirql team with more than a decade of experience in footwear manufacturing in Vietnam. Matt Smith, VP and general manager of OrthoLite Cirql, stated "OrthoLite Cirql is the critical solution needed to achieve true circularity in the footwear industry, and partnering with OrthoLite's family of brands and their Tier 1 shoemaking partners is a key next step in bringing this incredible and scalable innovation to the world." Cirql is a plastics-free, recyclable, biodegradable EVA that is industrially compostable. n A Roundup of Recent Developments about Places, Personnel & Product. IN THE MARKET / COMPANY NEWS 12 • Textile Insight ~ November/December 2022 textileinsight.com Touring Gore-Tex Brand ePE Labs Virtually OrthoLite Cirql Appoints Juan Cutina as Sales

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