Our Eco Legacy
Our Eco Legacy
Uniform
For Good
We make school uniform that empowers fair and good choices from our suppliers, employees and the students who wear it.
Why Choose David Luke School Uniform?
We make comfortable, durable school uniform that empowers students because it
meets their needs during the school day. Our purpose is to provide school
uniform in a way that empowers good choices. So how exactly do we do this?
We have pioneered the use of recycled polyester in our Eco-Uniform range for over a decade. During that time, we have prevented over 46 million 2l plastic bottles (all post-consumer waste) from entering landfill. That is a serious amount of eco-uniform in circulation. Until recently, our products were the best kept secret in the school uniform trade, available exclusively through our 600-strong network of independent retailers and now direct to families through our own website. David Luke School Uniform is on a mission to tell the story of its sustainable school uniform to families who live a conscious lifestyle and share our passion for all things eco. Not content with turning plastic into pristine blazers, skirts, trousers (the list goes on) we are focussed on how our sustainable uniform can be worn for longer, loved more and kept in circulation for generation after generation.
In recent years we have started to look beyond the bottle, keen to find a way to continue our innovative approach to manufacturing school uniform sustainably. Our collaboration with The Circular Textiles Foundation began in September 2022 with a mission to review the design and make-up of our bestselling eco-blazer to identify the steps needed to make it a circular garment. In order to manufacture circular garments, we need to design clothes which are made to be remade whilst ensuring the price of the garment doesn’t change. Consultation from the CTF and Project Plan B has enabled us to transition our blazers into mono-fabric recyclable garments, compatible with thermo-mechanical recycling processes.
Our first fully recyclable school blazers and jackets launched in Spring 2023.
Our first fully recyclable school blazers and jackets launched in Spring 2023.
Read more about our circularity journey with the Circular Textiles Foundation.
Who Makes Your Uniform?
In manufacturing our uniform to the highest ethical standards, we empower our supply chain to
provide the best working conditions. Acknowledging the significance of workers in a sustainable supply chain, we initiated foundation membership with the Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI) in 2019. As a business with sustainable principles at our core, it was important for us to gain a deeper understanding of what ethical trading means to our employees and our suppliers’ employees as the fashion and textiles industry evolves. We were delighted to be accepted as full ETI Members in 2023.
We have worked with many of our factories for over 25 years and have long standing, close relationships with them. Working with guidance from ETI has enabled us to gain further understanding of how our decisions can impact our suppliers and the people making our goods.
Ethical trading isn’t something that ever stops. It’s a continually evolving, learning process.
We are absolutely delighted that we have graduated to full membership. This means we can continue the hard work and understand more about: our people, the impact we have on them throughout our supply chain, ethical trading, and continued progress. This work will never be complete, we want to ensure we are always doing the right thing, for everyone.
Find out more about the factories we work with.
Know Your Impact
We will always put doing the right thing first to set a good example. Understanding the impact we make on our world and within our community is important. All the garments in our Eco-uniform range contain polyester made from non-biodegradable plastic drinking bottles, which would otherwise end up in landfill. Each item consists of part or total polyester content made from recycled plastic bottles.
Here’s a summary of the recycled content in our bestselling items in case you were wondering.
Eco-blazers & jackets
100% of the polyester in our Eco-blazers & jackets comes from recycled plastic bottles and they are
designed to be fully recyclable. The average number of bottles used is 18.
Eco-Shirts & Blouses
100% of the polyester in our Eco-shirts & Eco-blouses comes from recycled plastic bottles and they are designed to be fully recyclable. The average number of bottles used is 3.5.
Boys Eco-trousers & shorts
30% of the polyester used in our Boys Eco-trousers & Eco-shorts comes from recycled plastic bottles. The average number of bottles used is 4.
Girls Eco-trousers & skirts
100% of the polyester in our Girls Eco-trousers & Eco-skirts comes from recycled plastic bottles. The average number of bottles used is 5.
Eco-polo shirts
100% of the polyester in our Eco-polo shirts comes from recycled plastic bottles. The average number of bottles used is 2.
Eco-sweatshirts
100% of the polyester in our Eco-Sweatshirts comes from recycled plastic bottles. The average number of bottles used is 3.
Find out how a recycled plastic bottle becomes a David Luke Blazer, in just 6 steps.
