Taiwan textile Federation

Two is better than one: In addition to the Oeko-Texlogo, JAKO-O now adopts the bluesign standard with respect to the environmental friendliness of textile products. As Bettina Peetz, Director of JAKO-O states, "Clothing marked with the bluesign logo guarantees that the entire manufacturing process is not harmful to health AND is absolutely environmentally friendly." Through this, the catalog company for savvy children's items adopts its special responsibility for the future of children and the environment.

eco friendly textile According to Bettina Peetz, JAKO-O will continue to expand the choice of bluesign-certified products: "The goal is to have as much of our functional and outdoor collection certified as possible". Customers already see the "Oeko-Tex Standard 100" sign for textiles that do not pose a hazard to health on almost every piece of JAKO-O clothing. A great number of textiles even belong to Product Class 1 for baby products and with this, fulfill the strictest Oeko-Texrequirements.

eco friendly textile As Bettina Peetz, head of JAKO-O, emphasizes, "With the help of bluesign, we would like to convince our vendors of the benefits of saving scarce resources such as water and energy as well as replacing dangerous chemicals. In addition, production processes shall be optimized in order to reduce dangers for employees and customers".

JAKO-O continues its engagement in environmental and consumer protection through cooperation with bluesign: JAKO-O was certified according to the EC ECO-Audit Ordinance in 1999 as the first toy manufacturer. Together with TUV Rheinland, JAKO-O has also developed an expanded test program for material substances in shoes.

Environmental friendliness that carries logos: bluesign and Oeko-Tex

In contrast to Oeko-Tex Standard 100, in which the adherence of the limiting values for the chemicals that are used is checked, the end product is not the only thing evaluated by the bluesign standard. Rather, the entire production process is assessed - from the raw materials and the chemical components that are used through to the water and energy consumption and safety in the workplace. The bluesigncertificate is awarded independent of the manufacturers by Bluesign Technologies AG with registered office in Switzerland.

JAKO-O GmbH was founded in 1987 and belongs to the HABA corporate family in addition to the toy manufacturer, HABA, and the kindergarten and school furnisher, Wehrfritz. The owner and managing partner is Klaus Habermaass. Since 2004 JAKO-O has been developing new target groups with the Qiero! and FIT-Z sales divisions: While JAKO-O is aimed at children under 10 years of age, FIT-Z targets the youth ages of 10 to 16. Qiero! offers fashion for adults.

The HABA eco friendly textile corporate family employs approximately 1800 employees in Bad Rodach (Upper Franconia) in northern Bavaria. The entire HABA corporate family has been honored several times for its family friendly company policy with the 'Audit berufundfamilie ' certificate (German Career and Family Audit certificate), an initiative of the non-profit Hertie Foundation.

As a young student in 1989, fashionista Suzanne Lee hated science. After years of suffering through labs and tests in high school, the 19 year old Brit fled for art school, soon snuggling into a world of silk, seams, and buckles. But in 2003, while researching a book on future technologies of fashion, Lee bumped into a scientist at an art gallery in London. The chance meeting led to a discussion on the fashion industry's lack of sustainability, and how science, once Lee's arch-nemesis, might be eco friendly textile the industry's best hope.

BioBiker: Vegetable leather jacket
with black oxidation 'print'
Copyright of the BioCouture Project 2010


eco friendly textile "Textiles for clothing is one of the most polluting industries," says Lee, now a senior research fellow at the School of Fashion & Textiles at the Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design in London. Fashion labels typically invest slim to no money in research, she says, and are resistant to change, so it's up to designers to find and promote eco-friendly, high-tech alternatives. In an effort to lead the way, in 2003 Lee founded BioCouture, a fledgling research project proposing a futuristic fashion vision -- growing garments from vats of bacteria.

Today, Lee produces eerily beautiful jackets, dresses, and kimonos by culturing and shaping bacterial cellulose. The raw material for the clothing is grown for two weeks in a sugary green tea solution rich with bacteria and yeast. As the solution ferments, the microbes slowly excrete a sticky mat, forming a layer about 15mm thick. Lee carefully removes the layer, washes it in cold water, and spreads it on a flat wooden surface or smooth wooden mold to dry. Once all the water has evaporated, she peels the "textile," a stretchy, leather-like material, from the surface and cuts and sews it by hand. In an effort to avoid damaging the material with chemicals in dyes, Lee often colors it with fruit and vegetable stains. "Blueberry skins and beetroot work best," she says.

In the past seven years, Lee had made around 10 garments, many which have been on display at places like London's Science Museum. Though she has yet to gain the widespread acceptance of the fashion community -- "Fashion designers are fine about it as a material until you show how it's made and then they think it's somehow gruesome," she says -- Lee has become an eager recruit to the scientific community.

eco friendly textile Early on in the inception of BioCouture, Lee partnered with David Hepworth, a materials scientist she met in the museum, and they began to informally explore the idea by growing bacterial cellulose in his garage and her bathroom. Today, to improve upon that process, Lee collaborates with researchers at Imperial College London.



Cellulose naturally absorbs water, which doesn't make it an ideal material to sport on a rainy day. "The [cellulose] clothing takes up huge amounts of water and swells, making wearing it a bit unpleasant," says Alexander Bismarck, an Imperial College materials scientist. Rather than chemically altering the cellulose after it has been made, a tedious and not particularly eco-friendly process, Bismarck and Lee, along with Paul Freemont, head of molecular biosciences at Imperial College, are trying to modify the bacteria or growth medium directly to make the cellulose more hydrophobic. It hasn't been easy, says Bismarck: There's a fine line between clothes that turn to goo in the rain and clothes with no moisture absorption all. "Hopefully we will be able to produce a leather-like material from cellulose that has [appropriate] properties for the fashion world," says Bismarck. "I believe, a couple of years down the line, there will be a market for it."

Though Lee's clothing is not ready for that market quite yet -- despite a deluge of requests, she does not currently sell her creations -- she says she wants to make an impression on the next generation of designers. "I hope that BioCouture serves to at least raise people's awareness to a different way of thinking -- that [the fashion industry] should look to science for the solutions to our problems," says Lee. "We have really only just begun to imagine what we might grow using this process!"

And Lee's changing her tune with regard to her previous distaste for science. "I went to art school to escape science, only to find that the most exciting creative thinking right now is emerging from science," she laughs.

Read more: Haute culture - The Scientist - Magazine of the Life Sciences http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/57604/#ixzz0vWqRrLAn

Fabric application demand has increased to 325 million square meters in 2005, and 83 tons of fibre, mostly nylon has been used.
The world eco friendly textile airbag market is estimated to rise from 66 million units in 1996 to over 200 million units in 2006, a compound annual growth rate of 12 per cent. Over this decade, Europe will put in 60 million units, Asia-Pacific 30 million units and North America 24 million units.
While North American and Western European eco friendly textile markets are growing, considerable development is also seen in the international eco friendly textile market. As new applications are developing for eco friendly textile airbags, including rear seat bags, inflatable seat belts and an outside airbag system for pedestrians, new fabrics and combinations are being applied. The front and passenger bags have different requirements because of the distance from the occupant, but they both have rapid increment and deflation in a very short time span.
Rollover eco friendly textile bags must remain inflated for five seconds. In addition to new uses, expected trends include lighter fabric for use with newer “cold inflators,” blended with eco friendly textile materials like fabric and film, new coating polymers (Silicone now dominates having replaced neoprene).

The Indian fashion industry is just beginning to embrace sustainability. Clothing that mixes and matches fair trade, eco-sensitivity and style is also finding more buyers ...

Shoppers wander around an exhibition hall in Chennai running their hands through the yards of fine cotton of a sari, exclaiming over a particularly vivid design. But it's the tag that always makes them stop for a second look. Not because of the price, but because each tag has a stampsized photograph of the weaver. 'This product was hand-woven by N Ganesh in 1.5 days', says one tag on a pink and orange stole. Murugavel gets credit for an ebony-and-ivory sari that took seven days to craft, Mahesh for a brilliant aqua.

Ethicus, an organic cotton and ethical fashion brand launched late last year, aims to promote sustainable fashion - clothing produced by following fair trade practices with minimal impact on the earth. "Our philosophy is farm to fashion," says Mani Chinnaswamy, managing partner of Appachi Cotton that owns the Ethicus brand. "We grow organic cotton and do the ginning and weaving following eco-friendly practices," he says. Labourers and weavers are paid fair wages and their children educated for free in schools in Zamin Uthukuli village, Pollachi, in western Tamil Nadu.

Fashion's latest trend seems to be sustainability with both niche designers and mainstream brands playing up the fact that their products are green and clean. Both Van Heusen and Arrow launched organic cotton shirts this summer, and designers such as Anita Dongre and Rajesh Singh Rathore regularly use organic cotton.

Mumbai-based Dongre says her Grassroot sustainable fashion line, launched in 2007,was born of her interest in the environment. "I am sensitive about the Earth and wanted to convey the message through my creations," she says. Dongre eco friendly textile procures fabrics that are organically produced from suppliers who follow fair trade principles.

Chinaswamy, who runs Ethicus with wife Vijayalakshmi Nachiar, says they decided to adopt fair trade practices to help farmers and weavers. "These are hard jobs with poor returns," he says. "Neither farmers nor weavers want their children to follow them into the profession, but if we lose their skills, we lose an important part of our heritage," he says. He and Nachiar, a textile graduate, bought 42 looms, refurbished them and set up a design and weaving studio. While designers conceive the line (the current one was designed by Mumbai's Chelna Desai), local weavers adapt their old-world skills to produce new-age cotton fabrics. "Right now, this is a brand for the Indian market, but we're talking to Italian designers too," says Nachiar. Van Heusen's line is an acknowledgement of consumer preferences. "In the last few years, people have become more conscious about going green. We've always procured from suppliers with fair trade certification. We were giving out recyclable bags but decided to go a step further and create a 'green' shirt," says Shital Mehta, COO of Van Heusen, a brand from Aditya Birla Group's Madura Garments. Suresh J, CEO of Arvind (brands and retail), which has brands like Arrow and Flying Machine under its umbrella, says most of their factories have been approved by the international organisation Business Social Compliance Initiative. This means the company spends at least 10 per cent to 15 per cent more on its back-end." For instance, there are norms on eco friendly textile the kind of lighting we have to use, so we end up spending more on electricity. There should be more aisle space between each employee so per sq ft productivity is lower," he says. This makes garments 15 per cent to 20 per cent dearer but it's not just the rich they're selling to. "Often, the younger generation appreciates such values and displays loyalty to brands that follow these principles," says Suresh.Arati T Nagaraja, managing director of clothing brand Zeme Organics, too targets this population, "Not everyone can go to the farm to do their bit for the environment. But they will buy eco-friendly products at the right price."

eco friendly textile Van Heusen's Mehta agrees: "If the same look and feel are offered at the same price with the advantage of being environment-friendly, people will take it." Van Heusen has priced its Eco range between Rs 1,600 and Rs 1,800,like its other shirts, though it costs about 30 per cent more to produce it.

Despite the note of optimism and the definite buzz in the market, sustainable fashion is yet to catch on in India. The biggest limitation to it going mainstream is the cost. "Not much land is under organic cotton so procurement costs more," says Mehta. "But sustainable fashion will be big in the next few years and will drive customer choices."

eco friendly textile Getting certification from the likes of Global Organic Textile Standards is an expensive and often tedious process, which makes it intimidating for farmers to grow organic cotton. "There are some NGOs which work with small farmers and groups of farmers form cooperative societies to get certification," says Nagaraja.

It takes about three years just for the land to become 'clean' enough for organic cotton to be grown on it. "We kept paying contract farmers during that time," says Chinnaswamy, who buys cotton from about 180 farmers in the Kabini area. “You have to raise a couple of crops before your cotton meets certification standards."

In 2007, Appachi cotton received certification from Institute for Marketecology (IMO),a Swiss organisation that provides assurance for eco-friendly products, and from the Control Union of Netherlands, which approved its fair trade practices. "It's not hard, but definitely time-consuming and expensive," he says. Chinnaswamy says it'll take him three to six years to break even. "But we'll stick to it as we're working to keep a weaving tradition alive and get people to think of the Earth."

Indian manufacturers see going green as an inevitable choice. "The customer is open to the idea of spending a little more to make a responsible choice," says Chinnaswamy. "For a person in a city, a simple way to help the environment is to choose a product that's produced responsibly."