A Pāpāmoa Beach swimwear designer admits she’s baffled by companies that ask “what’s the catch” when she offers to teach them about zero waste garment production – for free.

Emma La Rocca is the owner of emroce; the world’s only zero-waste swimwear brand. She’s offering free zero-waste fashion trials to local companies, thanks to funding from Tauranga City Council aimed at reducing landfill waste.

“It’s as simple as changing the cutting plan, which takes as little as 15 minutes remotely, and brands can immediately save on fabric, labour and waste costs,” she says. “We’ve completed the work for the first two companies, but we had three brands cancel on us for the third spot. I’m surprised at how difficult it’s been to get brands to commit to or even show interest in the free zero-waste design trials that I’m offering.”

La Rocca has managed to fill the final space in her Tauranga trial with Carleen Schollum, who’s been working with sustainable fashion but hasn’t yet worked with zero-waste design.

“She’s excited to apply the techniques to the garments she’s currently working on,” La Rocca says.

While small brands are showing interest, La Rocca said the greatest impact will come from companies that are producing garments at scale.

“We are offering these trials nationwide as we would love to see ZWFD (zero-waste fashion design) rolled out across New Zealand’s entire fashion industry,” she says. “It helps us to have companies already interested before we receive the funding to work with them.”

La Rocca uses tessellating patterns to eliminate waste.

The cutting patterns are designed to fit together perfectly like a puzzle.

This technique, inspired by the zero-waste patterns of Japanese Kimono, propels creativity, allows companies to keep prices low due to less manufacturing costs and stops a quarter of the fabric from ending up in landfill.

Trials with local swimwear brand SAUCEswim cut fabric waste from 55% down to just 6.9% on one design and quartered cutting times.

“We’re taking a financial load off companies and a load off the planet,” she says. “Our landfills are filling up; that’s why this funding exists.”

The trials are free, flexible, and based on a company’s existing designs.

“They can apply the cutting plan changes straight away and benefit from the instant financial savings,” says La Rocca. “What I get from these trials is further proof that zero-waste design is easily applied to the production methods currently used in the fashion industry and a higher chance of convincing more brands to try it out.”