Chapter 1 — full chapter
Chapter 1 — full chapter
Chapter 1 — Introduction to Digital Product Passports
Guiding question : If every garment carried its own digital record — what it is made of, where it has been, how to repair or resell it — what would change about how we buy, use and discard fashion?
This chapter introduces circular design as a decision framework for product creation, that treats EU textile strategies and regulations as input param shaping product structure, material logic, and information requirements. The chapter situates fashion products using the idea of the “textile urban mine” to reframe garments as assets moving through city systems rather than disposable items. The chapter establishes lifecycle thinking as the foundation for all design decisions and introduces how garments operate as multi-life assets within urban material systems
Learning objective Learners will be able to explain what a Digital Product Passport is, how it works across the product lifecycle, what data it carries and who creates it, and why DPPs matter for transparency, circularity and business value in fashion.
Learning outcome: Learners will be able to identify the essential data fields of a textile DPP, explain how a passport travels with a garment from design to end-of-life, and assess the business value and limitations of DPPs for an SME.
Time: ≈ 3–5 h · reading & activities (2 h) · assignment (1–3 h) · quiz (10 min).
In this chapter:
- 1.1 What DPPs are
- 1.2 Why do they matter?
- 1.3 Business value
- 1.4 Scope and limitations