Bamboo?!?
We know what you’re thinking… Big, woody stems, a foliage plant
for your garden to shield you from outside view right?
Very right, but now also to shield you from the elements,
to caress your skin and to make you feel fabulous!
Some very clever person has come up with a way to make bamboo
into fabric, a fabric that is luxuriously soft to the touch
and had many benefits apart from coming from one of the worlds
fastest growing plants.
Now, imagine yourself in a hammock, with a coconut cocktail and
binoculars at hand, watching a field of bamboo growing a metre or
more PER DAY! It is actually a grass that continuously sends up
new shoots, this means no replanting is needed. Less work
(more hammock-time) for everybody!
Bamboo’s root systems are shallow and thick, rarely reaching more
than 40 cm under the ground and this combined with bamboo’s ability
to absorb and remove excess nitrogen and carbon from the soil means
it rarely leaches the soil of nutrients.
Have you ever considered the journey your new conventional cotton
t-shirt had taken before you fell in love with it at the shop and
just HAD to have it?
It probably would have started out as a fluff ball in an irrigated
cotton field. Your fashionable new t-shirt gulped down about 10,000
litres of our precious water for itself during its lifetime from
seed to shirt. We were shocked too!
It also munched, with a little help from its friends, 11% of the
world’s pesticides and 24% of its insecticides,
(whilst only covering 2.4% of the world’s crop land).
Bamboo, on the other hand, thrives naturally without the need for
pesticides or fertilizers, or irrigation for that matter. It takes
in nearly five times the amount of greenhouse gasses than the
equivalent strand of trees, and releases 35% more oxygen back
into the atmosphere.
By now you’re probably starting to see why we’re so excited about bamboo!
There are over 1200 species of bamboo in the world and please don’t worry,
the kind used for fabric (Moso: Phyllostachys heterocycla, also called
Phyllostachys edulis) is not the rare kind eaten by those cute endangered pandas!
The stems for making bamboo fabric are harvested after about a year when the
quality is at it’s highest. They are then pulped and spun into yarn.
Chinese scientists have found an anti-bacterial bio-agent called ‘bamboo kun’
in the ‘Moso’ bamboo species. Kinda like a feisty little special agent a’la
James Bond, only smaller, who fights off all the bacteria waiting to attack…
Well, this might not be exactly what happens but still, it makes for good pondering.
In any case, bamboo is not the best place for a bacteria colony and so is excellent
for towels, blankets and bed sheets.
It’s also a great choice of fabric for sanitary towels, diapers (a use growing in
popularity by the poop!) and other products where bacteria tend to grow. The natural
anti-bacterial properties in bamboo make it unnecessary to add any artificial
antimicrobial agents, which can cause skin allergies and irritations.
The bamboo fabric is incredibly soft, resembling silk in drape and fluidity and
cashmere to the touch. It’s a very breathable material, keeping you cool in summer
and warmer in winter, and absorbs water rather like a thirsty camel (3-4 times
better than cotton) leaving you drier, smelling fresher and feeling super!
Bamboo fibre clothing has the added bonus of being UV protective. A bamboo jersey
fabric in the USA was tested at the Suncare Research Lab in Winston Salem, N.C and
shown to have over 90% block for both UVA and UVB rays.
The UBF rating was 18, compared to an un-dyed cotton tee of about 8.
It’s still of course important to slop and slap!
(Slip, Slop, Slap? Check it out here )
It is also a highly biodegradable material, unlike synthetic fabrics like polyester and nylon.
(Don’t get us started about these, which are just OIL spun into yarn, read the the full
story here
So if you’d ever feel your product is of no further use to anyone, not even the dog,
you could theoretically bury the piece of clothing, sheet etc. in your backyard and
micro-organisms and the good old trusty sun would go to work.
Not that we think this is something most people would do, but it feels great to know
our clothing will go back to the earth just like we do in the end and not sit atop a
land-fill waste mountain, yodelling into eternity…
The thousand or so species of bamboo the world over also have many other claims to
fame apart from making fabulous things for us to wear.
It was the first plant to re-grow in Hiroshima after the atomic bomb of 1945; it
is used in Costa Rica for building houses that ‘dance’ to withstand earthquakes and
it’s used to stitch the soil together along fragile riverbanks and deforested areas,
taking advantage of the complex root system. It’s used in Ayurvedic medicine to treat
respiratory diseases and bamboo with it’s related industries financially support
millions of people around the world.
More commonly known uses include flooring and papermaking.
Oh! And great sounding wind chimes!
Bamboo fibre is being hailed as the new green eco-friendly material of the 21st
century, so get onboard the green love-bus and don’t forget your bamboo tee!
Summary:
Bamboo fabric is
• Biodegradable
• Eco friendly, bamboo is the fastest growing plant on earth and can be grown without pesticides and irrigation in an organic way, and it re-seeds itself
• Comfortable, luxurious feel with amazing drape
• Breathable, leaving you cooler in summer and warmer in winter
• Absorbent but fast drying
• Non-irritating, great for eczema and psoriasis sufferers
• Naturally antibacterial and antifungal
• Moisture-wicking to leave you fresh and sleeping comfortably
• Odour resistant, for a sweet smell!
• Protects against the sun’s UV rays
Conventional cotton is
• An extremely thirsty plant, requiring around 20,000 litres of precious water to produce a t-shirt and pair of jeans
• Currently using 11% of the world’s pesticides and 24% of its insecticides, whilst only covering 2.4% of its cropland.
• 73% of global cotton harvest comes from irrigated land
• Unsustainable, with massive inputs of water and pesticides, it has already been responsible for the destruction
of large-scale ecosystems such as the Aral Sea in central Asia and the deteriorating health and livelihoods of the people living there.
Footnote:
There are opinions out there about the way bamboo is made into yarn, saying the procedures are not exactly environmentally friendly.
Our opinion is that nothing is perfect in life, and even with these procedures bamboo is still the most sustainable option today.
At Kassiopeja we are always on the lookout for new solutions and we will always be striving towards perfection.
Please feel free to do your own research and make up your own mind!
References and more info for the knowledge-hungry:
Wikipedia – The free encyclopedia
Organic Clothing Blogs
The Bamboo Thematic Network
Interesting info on our Ecological Footprint
World Wildlife Fund
Liese, W. 1987. Research on Bamboo. Wood Science and Technology.
Nishina, A., Hasegawa, K., Uchibori, T., Seine, H., and Osawa,
T. 1991. 2,6-Dimethoxy-p-benzouinone as an Antibacterial Substance
in the Bark of Phyllostachys heterocycla var. Pubescens, a Species
of Thick-Stemmed Bamboo. Journal of Agricultural Food Chemistry 39:266-269.
Lin, J., He, X., Hu, Y., Kuang, T., and Ceulemans, R. 2001.
Lignifications and lignin heterogeneity for various age classes of
bamboo (Phyllostachys pubescens) stems. Physiologia Plantarum 114:296-302.
Nishimura, O. 2004. The Role of Bamboo in the Sustainable Economic
Development: From a Viewpoint of Social Common Capital. Japan Society
of Mechanical Engineering International Journal 47(4): 527-532.
Wang, H.X. and Ng, T.B. 2003. Dendrocin, a distinctive antifungal protein
from bamboo shoots. Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications 307:750-755.
We believe in sustainable practices combined with art and beauty,
an everyday balance of practicality and creativity, and trying to
make our footprint as light as possible so our children will have
the chance to experience the natural world in all its
glory. We believe that art and nature are intrinsically connected and
we want to uphold that delicate balance.All material ©Kassiopeja 2009-2010
info[a]kassiopeja.com
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