textiles

Surfwear company Billabong is using a new material called ECO Supreme Suede for some of its boardshorts and swim suits. The exclusive material is eco-friendly made from recycled textiles and plastic soda bottles (rPET). The company says its cool new material doesn't sacrifice on quality.

It sounds like a common enough story. Freshly minted parent can’t find chemical-free clothing for their new-to-the-world child. What makes this version different from so many of the introductions found on new green apparel websites, is that it happened 32 years ago. Heinz Hess created organic clothing for his son, and in doing so pioneered a corporate ethic, through his firm Hess Natur, that is only now being taken up by the most enlightened of businesses.

A model of responsible enterprise that is soon to be making its presence felt in North America. A German clothing company that pays 40% more than they could fo...

Your fingers will itch for a pair of needles when you see the luxurious, stylish and ethical knitting yarns and craft kits from The Toft Alpaca Shop. A peek at The Toft Alpaca Shop's introduction information immediately convinces one that Toft is committed to sustainable and ethical best practices across the entire product line and all production processes. For example: Alpaca wool is harvested from the flock at the Toft site or purchased from farms within 50 miles of the point of sale. All hand-knitted finished products are crafted by knitters working from home in the surrounding areas -...

Bread & Butter, the trade show for selected brands, opened its summer doors again in Barcelona today for 3 days of clothing culture under the concept ‘New Order’. Apart from some of our favourite eco fashion labels we already met at Bread & Butter King Size in January, we really liked the ‘Collection of Hope’, resulting from a workshop by students of the ESMOD fashion schools. Africa and Social Responsibility inspired this project and lead to a discussion of textiles and clothing in modern Africa from dive...

Over the last year there has been a relative rush of books on eco and ethical fashion published in the UK. We think this is an excellent indicator of the public’s awareness of how, what, where and whom produced the clothes in our closets. First was Tamsin Blanchard’s Green is the New Black, then Mathilda Lee’s Eco-Chic and most recently Kate Fletcher’s Sustainable Fashion and Textiles: Design Journeys and not forgetting Sa...

Patagonia have updated their Webby Award nominated Footprint Chronicles website with five new product lifecycle assessments (LCAs). The additions are their Nine Trails shorts, Sugar and Spice shoe, Capilene 3 bottoms Vitaliti strappy dress and Puckerware shirt.

That last product (seen above) traveled 22,000 km from its fabric source to distribution centre expending enough energy per shirt to run a 18W light bulb nonstop for 49 days. The shirt created the of 41 times it’s own weight in CO2 emissions and created waste equal to 2/3rds of its weight. And Patagonia can’t yet find...