What Is ECONYL® Fabric...
... and where does it come from?
by the Wai-Lā Team
If you've been looking at sustainable swimwear, you've probably seen the word ECONYL® on a label or a brand's website. It gets used a lot, sometimes without much explanation. Here's what it actually is.
It's regenerated nylon — made from waste
ECONYL® is a type of nylon produced by an Italian company called Aquafil. What makes it different from regular nylon is where the raw material comes from. Instead of being made from petroleum, ECONYL® is made from nylon waste — things like fishing nets recovered from the ocean, fabric offcuts from factories, carpet flooring that would otherwise go to landfill, and other industrial nylon scraps.
These materials get collected, sorted, and processed back into nylon yarn. The end result is chemically identical to virgin nylon — same strength, same stretch, same performance — but it didn't require any new fossil fuels to produce.
Where the waste actually comes from
Although they are the most striking, the fishing nets are just a part of gets regenerated. Abandoned or lost fishing nets — sometimes called ghost nets — are one of the more damaging forms of ocean plastic. They drift for years, trapping marine animals and breaking down into smaller fragments. Aquafil works with organisations that collect these nets from coastal communities and the sea floor, mostly in places like Slovenia, Norway, and parts of Southeast Asia.
The factory offcuts come from manufacturers who produce nylon textiles — the scraps that get trimmed away during production and would otherwise be binned. And the carpet waste is collected from commercial buildings when flooring gets replaced, before it goes to landfill.
None of this is a silver bullet for ocean plastic — the volumes involved don't come close to solving the problem at scale. But diverting material that already exists, rather than producing new, is a meaningful step down in impact.
Why we use it for Wai-Lā swimwear
Swimwear gets a hard life — chlorine, salt water, sunscreen, UV exposure. The fabric needs to hold its shape, keep its colour, and not degrade quickly. ECONYL® handles all of that the same way virgin nylon does, which is why it's become the standard choice for swimwear brands that want performance without the footprint of conventional materials.
For us, it also fits with why Wai-Lā exists in the first place. A fabric made partly from recovered fishing nets, used to make swimwear worn in the ocean — that connection matters to us. It's not just a marketing angle. It's the reason the choice felt right.
One thing worth knowing
ECONYL® can itself be recycled at the end of a garment's life — the yarn can theoretically go back into the same process. In practice, textile recycling infrastructure in the UK isn't quite there yet for most consumers. So the more useful thing to focus on right now is how long the garment lasts. A well-made piece in ECONYL® fabric, cared for properly, should last several seasons — which does more for its overall footprint than the material alone.
ECONYL® is one of our answers. It won’t be the last.
Explore our swimwear collection at wailaswimwear.com — pieces designed for the coast, made with care for what lies beneath it.
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