Much has been made in recent years about the fashion industry’s toll on the environment – first in terms of the great amount of resources used in the manufacture of clothing; and second in regards to ‘fast fashion’ and the trend to wear items as little as once before throwing them away. So just when critical eyes are on the industry, it has come up with something to boost its green credentials: fabrics that ‘suck’ CO2 out of the atmosphere.
The secret ingredient is algae. Designer Charlotte McCurdy has produced a bioplastic mac using algae powder. And London-based Post Carbon Lab is using algae to make clothes that photosynthesise (according to the company, one of its T-shirts generates about the same amount of oxygen as a six-year-old oak tree) – and it believes the coating material can be used to make environmentally friendly shoes, curtains, pillow cases and umbrellas, among other applications.
It is not just start-ups that are branching out into sustainable apparel. Hugo Boss and H&M are using a textile made from pineapple leaves called Piñatex, for example. Elsewhere, Mexican company Desserto is making a leather alternative from cactus plants; while Dutch company NEFFA is developing garments from mycelium (the ‘root’ of the mushroom) under the brand MycoTEX.
The examples above are not carbon-capturing in the same way as the algae-derived clothing, but taken together it all goes to show that there is potential for fashion to not only clean up its act, but to make clothing that is actually beneficial to the environment. All it needs to do now is make the stuff washing-machine-friendly…
further reading…
Much has been made in recent years about the fashion industry’s toll on the environment – first in terms of the great amount of resources used in the manufacture of clothing; and second in regards to ‘fast fashion’ and the trend to wear items as little as once before throwing them away. So just when critical eyes are on the industry, it has come up with something to boost its green credentials: fabrics that ‘suck’ CO2 out of the atmosphere.
The secret ingredient is algae. Designer Charlotte McCurdy has produced a bioplastic mac using algae powder. And London-based Post Carbon Lab is using algae to make clothes that photosynthesise (according to the company, one of its T-shirts generates about the same amount of oxygen as a six-year-old oak tree) – and it believes the coating material can be used to make environmentally friendly shoes, curtains, pillow cases and umbrellas, among other applications.
It is not just start-ups that are branching out into sustainable apparel. Hugo Boss and H&M are using a textile made from pineapple leaves called Piñatex, for example. Elsewhere, Mexican company Desserto is making a leather alternative from cactus plants; while Dutch company NEFFA is developing garments from mycelium (the ‘root’ of the mushroom) under the brand MycoTEX.
The examples above are not carbon-capturing in the same way as the algae-derived clothing, but taken together it all goes to show that there is potential for fashion to not only clean up its act, but to make clothing that is actually beneficial to the environment. All it needs to do now is make the stuff washing-machine-friendly…