We love tencel, and we know many of you do too! This soft, drapey fabric is made from Eucalyptus fiber, a renewable resource. When investigating fabric one of the key things that we look at is the manufacturing process and the chemicals that are required by that process. Some fabrics which use sustainable resources, such as bamboo, are extremely harmful to the environment due to the process required to turn them into fabric.
We are often asked why we don’t use Bamboo fabrics for our clothing. While it is true that Bamboo is fast growing and uses little or no pesticides, we wanted to share with you a consumer alert published by the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) titled “Have You Been Bamboozled?”. This raises many of the points that we consider when making fabric selections, here is an excerpt:
“The Federal Trade Commission, the nation’s consumer protection agency, wants you to know that the soft “bamboo” fabrics on the market today are rayon. They are made using toxic chemicals in a process that releases pollutants into the air. Extracting bamboo fibers is expensive and time-consuming, and textiles made just from bamboo fiber don’t feel silky smooth.
There’s also no evidence that rayon made from bamboo retains the antimicrobial properties of the bamboo plant, as some sellers and manufacturers claim. Even when bamboo is the “plant source” used to create rayon, no traits of the original plant are left in the finished product.”
Tencel is made from cellulose in wood pulp, often raised on land that is unsuitable for food crops or grazing. The fiber is produced via an advanced ‘closed loop’ solvent spinning process, with minimal impact on the environment and economical use of energy and water. The solvent used in the process is toxic but 99% is recovered and continually recycled. This provides an obvious environmental benefit, but is also important to us because it means that the workers processing the fabric are not being exposed to the chemical during disposal.
Another fabric, Modal, so soft that it is hard to resist, uses an open loop process which requires a new batch of chemicals for each production run.
There are a few other reasons that we love Tencel, most of which you will thoroughly appreciate if you have ever worn a Tencel garment.
Drape: Soft, Fluid and Natural this fabric is known for it’s drape.
Comfort: Lightweight and breathable.
Easy: Wrinkle resistant, Travel friendly, Machine washable and quick drying.
Color rich: Because of it’s high absorbency, Tencel fabrics pick up to the darkest hue of each of our dye colors.
Tencel was awarded the European Union Environmental Award 2000 in the category of “technology for sustainable developments.” Isn’t it awesome that you can feel so good about a fabric that feels so good!