Maidstone Borough Council in Kent, UK, is experimenting with using discarded fast fashion clothing to fill potholes. Five potholes in several Maidstone parks have already been filled with a new low-carbon patching material made from recycled clothing.

According to hometownregister.com, the pilot is being run by the council in partnership with sustainable materials company RECOOL, with contractor Loughman carrying out the work. The pilot sites were chosen at Mote Park and Penenden Heath on council-owned land, because maintenance responsibility for public roads lies with Kent County Council and is outside the borough council's jurisdiction.

On the materials side, recycled textile waste is used to fill the main body of the pothole, with a specialized top layer laid over it. The core aim is to test whether old clothing can serve as an environmentally friendly alternative material for road repairs.

Data from UK charity WRAP shows that the UK generates about 1.45 million tonnes of waste textiles each year, nearly half of which ends up in general waste. This context is the starting point for Maidstone's pilot.

Maidstone Borough Council councillor Rachel Rodwell said that while second-hand resale platforms extend the life of many garments, fast fashion still leads to huge amounts of textiles being discarded, and the pilot is intended to turn this problem into an opportunity. She said that by testing whether waste textiles can be a component of pothole repair material, the council is exploring a viable path that combines waste reduction, carbon reduction and the circular economy.

Another councillor, Clive English, added from the perspective of park maintenance that parks and open spaces receive millions of visits each year, and keeping them safe, accessible and well maintained is the top priority. He believes this trial puts a potentially game-changing product to the test of daily use and the UK's changeable weather in a real-world setting; although responsibility for potholes on public roads lies with Kent County Council, the council is still willing to share the pilot results with any interested organization.

At present, the repair work has been completed, and the material's performance under daily park use and weather conditions will be monitored over the coming months.

Elise Daly of RECOOL said the company is delighted to work with Maidstone Borough Council and Loughman. According to her, RECOOL converts mixed textile waste into practical, low-carbon alternatives to traditional plastic products, finding new uses for materials that might otherwise be discarded, and she hopes such innovations can help councils and businesses reduce waste, lower carbon emissions and create value for local communities.

From the perspective of the used clothing trade, this pilot offers a new signal: beyond the export and recycling destinations of textile waste, localized, non-garment disposal pathways are being incorporated by local governments into actual procurement and engineering scenarios, which could affect the future sorting and flow structure of textile waste.

Source: Council using fast fashion waste to plug potholes · Originally published 2026-09-25