We have a brief write up on cotton and linen on our ethical journey page, however we want to delve into a little more details to help you gain a better understanding of these fabrics.
Lets start with cotton.
Did you know that the average standard cotton t-shirt uses 2,700 litres of water to make - yep, you read that right!
We use certified organic cotton, which means it passes a global standard of testing to ensure the fabric is truly organic. This certification ensures a lot of things, here is a breakdown.
- Organic cotton is made from natural seeds (non GMO), and there is no use of pesticides or other harmful chemicals.
- Bugs are controlled with insects that kill the pests, rather than harmful chemicals, thus encouraging biodiversity in the ecosystem.
- Organic cotton is rotated from one soil to another, which encourages nutrients to remain in the soil, this also requires less irrigation, encouraging rainfall to water the crop, reducing water wastage.
- Organic cottons manufacturing and weeding process is all done by hand, which means no harmful chemicals are used. In turn, this actually creates a more pure cotton crop.
- It is estimated that thousands of people exposed to the chemicals used in non-organic cotton production die of cancer, poisoning, and miscarriages each year. This exposure to toxic chemicals is really taking its toll in developing countries.
- Organic cotton produces around 46% less CO2e compared to conventional cotton.
By choosing to buy organic cotton you are enhancing the health of humans, animals and natural resources around the world.
Now lets talk linen!
Linen is the perfect fabric for summer, breezy, lightweight and breathable. But its also great for a lot of other reasons too!
- Linen is one of the most biodegradable fabrics on the market, when left untreated it is even 100% biodegradable.
- Linen is make from the flax plant. Flax is incredibly easy to grow, and requires little to no chemicals and pestisides.
- Every part of the flax plant is used in some way, which means nothing is wasted! Linseed oil and flaxseed oil are just a few of the other awesome things made from the flax plant.
- Flax is incredibly resilient, and can grow in poor soil with very little water.
- It is estimated that one linen shirt uses 6.4 litres of water, now think of that compared to 2,700 litres for a standard cotton t-shirt!
