Blue Cast: Tuncay Kilickan Shares His Vision for TENCEL™ Denim and Carved in Blue
This fall has been a time of change for the Lenzing Denim team. After more than two decades at the company, Tricia Carey moved on from Lenzing. And in October, Tuncay Kilickan joined Lenzing as head of global business development, denim.
Tuncay, who is based in Turkey, came to Lenzing from the denim world. For 17 years, he was on the product development team at denim mill Isko, working on new fabrics and concepts and engaging with the denim world at trade shows around the globe.
On the latest episode of our Blue Cast podcast, Tuncay sat down with Lenzing consultant Mohsin Sajid of Endrime to chat about what is next for Lenzing in denim. One of the main themes of their discussion was Lenzing’s work with mills to incorporate its fibers into textile innovations. Mohsin noted that Lenzing’s booths at denim shows are usually full of collections from its mill partners, showcasing what is possible with TENCEL™.
Tuncay’s history with TENCEL™ predates his start at Lenzing. In 2018, he created a denim concept that mimicked the look of cotton with 100 percent TENCEL™ fibers. Called Cottonized, this concept was just one of his patents developed while at Isko.
There is a push in the industry to reduce the dependency on cotton, in part due to price fluctuations and availability concerns from droughts and flooding. Recently, for the first time, TENCEL™ was actually the same price as cotton, making it more cost competitive. As mills use materials like recycled cotton and hemp, TENCEL™ can support these switches, giving shorter recycled fibers more strength and adding a soft hand feel to coarse hemp.
As Tuncay pointed out, only three new fibers have been introduced commercially in the last century: viscose, modal and lyocell. While Lenzing has made variants on these base fibers—such as matte TENCEL™ and TENCEL™ Modal with Indigo Color technology, many of the innovations are coming from how the fibers are used within the context of textile production. For example, at the retail level, Denham launched a zero-cotton denim concept. And Artistic Milliners has started mechanically recycling TENCEL™ from its production.
“The denims we used to see in the shop is nothing to do with the denims we see now. We are reinventing the authentic denim…in a different level, with kind of a modern tweak,” Tuncay said. “So with the same ingredient material, we can always come up with some alternative solutions.”
The sustainability discussion is constantly evolving. Organic cotton was a big buzzword just a few years ago, but that has now been overshadowed by companies touting recycled cotton and regenerative agriculture. In finishing, there has also been a shift from potassium permanganate and stonewashing towards lower impact techniques.
“Sometimes we do not have a solution for certain things,” Tuncay said. “With continuous thinking on those problems, maybe not today but tomorrow we can come up with a solution. We should not be pessimistic. Already we are going—maybe slow, but we’re going ahead.”
Among Tuncay’s focuses in his new role is overseeing Carved in Blue, the platform created by the Lenzing Denim team about five years ago to showcase what is happening in the denim world. He pointed out the importance of digital platforms like Carved in Blue for providing education to new generations of denim professionals across the supply chain. This includes developments in sustainability.
“We’re trying to create a platform that anyone who contributes to the future of denim, from different angles, they can freely, happily push their products and stories on our platform,” said Tuncay. “We would like to support all of these initiatives to make our denim industry even better than yesterday.”
Listen to the episode here.
If you missed meeting Tuncay at trade events this fall, he will be at Bluezone and Kingpins New York early next year. You can also reach out to say hi at denim@lenzing.com.