Regenerative Textiles: Field-to-Field Circularity and Community-Led Bioeconomies for Climate Adaptation

Summary

This PhD investigates how regenerative textile systems can be developed through design-led, field-to-field models that integrate fibre cultivation, land stewardship, and community making within circular and place-based loops.

Drawing on the Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s circular design principles (2021), Textile Exchange’s current Climate+ Strategy (n.d.) and Fibershed’s bioregional frameworks (Burgess, 2019), the research approaches regeneration as both an ecological process and a culturally embedded design practice.

It asks how textile design can operate as a form of rural infrastructure for climate adaptation supporting local skills, livelihoods, and economies of care.

In collaboration with the Irish Grown Wool Council and Mourne Textiles, the project employs participatory action research and co-design to prototype decentralised textile systems that return material, social, and ecological value to place, reflecting recent research around ‘Restoration and Redesign’ (Gault & Duffy, 2025).

These experiments explore fibre properties, local processing routes, natural colour and dye ecologies, repair cultures, and waste recovery, examining how community-led micro-infrastructures might complement, disrupt, or reconfigure prevailing industrial systems (Linton, 2025).

The prototypes are conceived as “living laboratories” where traditional knowledge, land-based practices, and contemporary co-design innovation intersect (Escobar, 2018).

While regenerative fibre systems are gaining visibility, current frameworks often remain technocratic, privileging measurement over meaning and efficiency over identity.

The cultural, social, and design dimensions of regeneration material heritage, distributed making, attachment, and identity are comparatively underexplored.

There is also a persistent disconnection between textile and food systems, despite their historical co-dependence in rural economies.

By positioning regenerative textiles as both design practice and ecosystem infrastructure, this PhD connects material experimentation with social innovation.

Design outputs include material samples, toolkits, participatory frameworks, and exhibition work will communicate regeneration as both process and proposition, offering a community-led, design-centred pathway toward a circular bioeconomy aligned with climate adaptation, citizen participation, and cultural resilience.

Essential criteria

Applicants should hold, or expect to obtain, a First or Upper Second Class Honours Degree in a subject relevant to the proposed area of study.

We may also consider applications from those who hold equivalent qualifications, for example, a Lower Second Class Honours Degree plus a Master’s Degree with Distinction.

In exceptional circumstances, the University may consider a portfolio of evidence from applicants who have appropriate professional experience which is equivalent to the learning outcomes of an Honours degree in lieu of academic qualifications.

• A comprehensive and articulate personal statement
• Research proposal of 2000 words detailing aims, objectives, milestones and methodology of the project

Desirable Criteria

If the University receives a large number of applicants for the project, the following desirable criteria may be applied to shortlist applicants for interview.

• Completion of Masters at a level equivalent to commendation or distinction at Ulster
• Practice-based research experience and/or dissemination
• Experience using research methods or other approaches relevant to the subject domain
• Work experience relevant to the proposed project

Equal Opportunities

The University is an equal opportunities employer and welcomes applicants from all sections of the community, particularly from those with disabilities.

Appointment will be made on merit.

Funding and eligibility

This project is funded by:

• CO-CREATE Ireland

This scholarship will cover tuition fees and provide a maintenance allowance of £21,403 per annum (with a 3% annual increase) for three years (subject to satisfactory academic performance).  An additional limited travel budget is available.

To be eligible for these scholarships, applicants must meet the following criteria:

• Be a UK National, or
• Have settled status, or
• Have pre-settled status, or
• Have indefinite leave to remain or enter, or
• Be an Irish National

Applicants should also meet the residency criteria which requires that they have lived in the EEA, Switzerland, the UK or Gibraltar for at least the three years preceding the start date of the research degree programme.

Applicants who already hold a doctoral degree or who have been registered on a programme of research leading to the award of a doctoral degree on a full-time basis for more than one year (or part-time equivalent) are NOT eligible to apply for an award.

Due consideration should be given to financing your studies.