AAC Têxteis develop and produce fashion
Our responsibility is to understand the artistic vision and emotional dynamics that underpin creative ideas, and embody that nature in distinctive garments of the highest quality.
The value we bring lies in applying that knowledge without limits, to shape personalized fashion supply-chain solutions that unlock the true potential of ‘Made in Portugal’.
Brands have their own languages and systems and every designer, a through-line that guides their decisions. At the point AAC joins the project, we have to be able to recognise that through-line, to understand how design can or will look.
Capabilities
AAC tailor the supply chain to meet the exact requirements of a particular idea
For AAC, sourcing means introducing materials that reduce negative impact, work from a functional point of view and deliver the customer’s intended message.
The on-site archive of over 25,000 fabrics from the very best knitting and weaving mills globally, as well as a constantly evolving selection of accessories, trims and various techniques (printing, embroidery and washes), serves as an important source of inspiration for our customers.
Design has to work and whether drafting or draping, the pattern making team ensures a balance between design detail and function, so that concepts happen and fit.
Prototyping enables us to define and give form to the idea the designer has in mind.
To do this at a speed that can be in parallel with a designer’s creative thinking pre-runway, we rely on the accuracy and proficiency of our dedicated atelier and pattern making teams in our head office.
When the creative idea is given tangible form, its material parts must be available at the earliest possible opportunity.
The purchasing department are highly proactive in their approach, placing orders immediately and leveraging AAC’s consolidated customer portfolio and long-standing working relationships with the global network of leading textile mills and accessory suppliers, to guarantee best prices and ensure that orders are ready, ahead of time, without any disruption.
AAC views production as the organisation of an idea’s individual parts into a consistent whole.
Product supply chains are coordinated according to the unique requirements of an idea. AAC oversees the entire progression of each part of the process, with dedicated technical teams ensuring each separate product element is flawless in form and combined in complete harmony, without variation.
Our highly practical and efficient logistic department have vast experience in making deliveries worldwide by air, land and sea and work closely to ensure all products are kept delivered on-time to each final destination.
Impact
We, AAC TÊXTEIS, are complicit in the climate breakdown and the toxic patterns / cycles that have shaped and are shaping our unequal and unsustainable world. Although our commitment to being ‘sustainable’ has been honest and prominent, what we have done in the context of a climate emergency and ongoing social crises has not been enough.
Theory of Change
“Sustainability” focuses on doing things better, so that no more harm is done to people or ‘the environment’, but what about the harm that has already been done? and should the ultimate goal stop at ‘no more harm’?
Despite the current efforts, achieving “sustainability” is still a long way off. Generally, change is happening too slowly, compared to the state of emergency we face and the change that is taking place is happening within clearly unsustainable systems, as both environmental and social degradation are continuing.
We think our approach has wrongly focused on addressing the symptoms of unsustainability, rather than the root causes.
Instead, the change needed to heal that harm already done, will begin when we see ‘natural’ and ‘human’ systems as interconnected, instead of separate parts and start to think holistically. It is only at this point that we will start to do better things, rather than just doing things better.
This is the approach AAC is taking and wants to encourage across our entire supply network. Our Theory of Change maps out the pathway to that change and the assumptions behind each step. Although we might take some wrong steps along the way, the journey will be completely transparent and action accountable, so that together with our customers we can enable significant change for good.
Certifications And Audits
Third-party certification is not a proxy for sustainable practice. It does provide some further support, in specific areas, to demonstrate that what is being said and done matches.
SMETA
Local Cluster
Over 2000 interconnected textile & apparel companies within a 25km radius.
We are uniquely positioned within the geographic cluster of: textile mills; garment manufacturers; dyeing, printing and finishing specialists and related technological and educational institutions in and around the Porto and Braga regions of Portugal.
Our operational model relies on the longstanding relationships we have developed with those members of our region’s local cluster, all of which guarantee competitive advantages that would be hard to match:
- The geographic concentration of our production network has directly contributed to our current lead times of 5 to 6 weeks and will continue to positively affect the speed to market of customer products.
- The readily-available access to complementary specialists, guarantees cost- effectiveness and an ability to deal immediately with disruption.
- Having such a local and well-diversified supply base, greatly reduces the carbon footprint of any product we produce.