Peak Performance R&D Helium Loop Anorak

Peak Performance unveils the R&D Helium Loop Anorak, a ground-breaking concept project demonstrating how down-insulated garments now have the potential to be designed for circularity.

The R&D Helium Loop won a prestigious ISPO Award, with the ISPO Jury commenting: “This Anorak combines innovative solutions that are already available today and shows that recyclability and circular economy are possible least in some areas. Neither aesthetic nor functionality suffer as a result.”

“True circularity means designing garments to be unmade as thoughtfully as they’re made. R&D Helium Loop shoes that the premium design with responsible end-of-life in mind is not only possible but promising, and we continue advancing it with our partners.” – Marie Andersson, Peak Performance.

Until now, products combining multiple materials, such as natural down insulation, have been unfeasible to recycle due to the complexity of disassembling and separating the individual materials at end-of-life. Through this collaborative project, Peak Performance has developed a technique which uses Resortecs’ Smart Stitch, a heat-dissolvable sewing thread to enable easy materials separation. Under specific controlled conditions the thread melts away, allowing both the fabric and the down to be recycled through their specific supply chains.

The Peak Performance R&D Helium Loop uses a lightweight 20D Pertex Quantum made from NetPlus – 100% post-consumer recycled nylon fishing nets. Pertex NetPlus fabrics support cleaner communities and oceans by diverting an existing waste stream. By replacing new plastics with post-consumer recycled NetPlus, we are able to prevent a harmful waste from entering the environment, and reduce the need to extract fossil fuels. 

Our partner Bureo works directly with fishing communities to collect their discarded fishing net waste and bring positive, end-of-use solutions to the most harmful form of ocean pollution. Through this collaboration we are working to set an industry standard for the way recycled materials are used, continuing to push forward with a positive impact approach to sourcing the materials required to make our products.

 Find out more about the Peak Performance Helium Loop Anorak