Fashion students at De Montfort University Leicester (DMU) will gain hands-on experience of technology used by industry to design more sustainable products and respond to new environmental regulations.
DMU has become the first university in the UK to embed CircKit’s circular fashion technology across its curriculum, giving students practical experience of the tools and approaches increasingly being used by fashion businesses.
The partnership will enable students to work with lifecycle assessment (LCA) tools and explore how decisions made at the design stage can affect a product’s environmental impact, commercial viability and ability to meet regulatory requirements.
As the fashion industry responds to growing expectations around sustainability, product lifecycles and environmental accountability, these skills are becoming increasingly important for graduates entering the sector.
CircKit will initially support teaching around circular design, lifecycle assessment and compliance, helping students understand how sustainability considerations translate into real-world design and business decisions.
Stuart Lawson, Deputy Head of the School of Design Innovation at DMU, said: “Adopting CircKit has been a natural step in embedding the Design Council’s Skills for Planet within our School’s curricula.
“It allows us to bring lifecycle assessment into the heart of teaching, giving students a practical way to understand sustainability and, importantly, act on it.
“By giving students experience of the tools and challenges they will encounter in industry, we can help them understand the relationship between good design, environmental impact and the commercial realities facing fashion businesses.”
The collaboration developed from initial discussions about introducing lifecycle assessment into fashion design teaching and has grown into a wider partnership covering circular design, sustainability and regulatory requirements.
Students will be able to explore the consequences of different design and supply-chain choices through realistic scenarios, building their understanding of areas including Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) and Digital Product Passports (DPPs).
The approach reflects DMU’s commitment to working with industry to ensure teaching responds to changing skills needs and prepares graduates for the challenges they will face in the workplace.
Joe Darwen, founder and CEO of CircKit, said: “DMU quickly recognised the interplay of CircKit’s various modules and how they can support their syllabus.
“They saw the bigger opportunity and, in doing so, are setting a new benchmark for what industry-ready fashion education can look like.”
CircKit brings together environmental impact, commercial and compliance information to help fashion and footwear businesses consider sustainability earlier in the design process.
Its introduction at DMU will give students experience of balancing those competing considerations rather than considering sustainability in isolation. The partnership also builds on DMU’s established expertise in sustainable fashion and textiles and its work with businesses to support innovation and more sustainable approaches across the sector.
CircKit for Universities is an academic licensing programme designed to bridge that gap, giving students hands-on access to the circular design and compliance tools used by real industry teams. De Montfort University is the first institution publicly confirmed to go live with the platform, embedding CircKit across multiple courses.
Posted on Monday 17 August 2026