How Plastic Bottles Become the Fabric Used in newSKY

The material used for the upper of newSKY is called Eco-fi, a high-quality polyester fabric made out of post-consumer plastic bottles – about 8 makes one pair. Within just a few steps, plastic becomes a usable, recycled textile. Here's how it's done.

It starts with millions of tiny plastic bottle flakes. The bottles are sorted by color, washed and chopped into flakes at a recycling plant before being shipped to Foss Manufacturing - a company that specializes in producing textiles from recycled materials.

The flakes are melted into molten plastic and pulled through over 2,000 tiny holes called "spinnerets" that create the shape of the filament. Soon after, the newly formed strands are cooled to hold their shape.

The spun filaments are then drawn out and stretched over heated rollers. Heating and stretching provides strength and tenacity - the more the fiber is stretched, the stronger it becomes.

After the flat fibers have been drawn, they are crimped to look like the bellows of an accordion. Crimping allows the needles to easily dig into the fiber when it's ready to be transformed into fabric.

The newly crimped fibers are pulled apart into smaller pieces and smoothed out.

The smoothed fibers are sent through over 6,000 needles that weave them together to create the strong, even-looking polyester fabric.

The finished material is placed into rolls, ready to be used for newSKY. In the end, 12 plastic bottles can make about one pound of fiber.