As the arguments rage on about greenwashing and eco claims by clothing brands brands that use organic cottons or bamboo, I like to simply use the standards from Ecologo for organic cotton. It cannot have been dyed.Which means beige.

There is also a growing movement to have the word "organic" removed as a reference to clothing made with organic cotton. While the cultivation of cotton itself is organic, the processes that come after, with the addition of chemical dyestuffs etc, renders it NOT organic. This to me is a solid argument. If we look at the standards used in organic meats as an example, when a cow gets sick and is injected with hormones to cure it, it has to be taken out of the organic pen immediately. The same thing should be done for clothing made from organic cotton. True, there are groups that subscribe to a hard core organic process, taking the organically grown cotton and putting it through processes that use only organic inks or dyes or at the very least eco friendly dyes. If these brands can prove their processes, then I am all for supporting their eco claims.

When we started out to make clothing that would leave the lightest possible footprint, we looked at the heavy impact that clothing has on the environment.

It starts off with the usual deforestation for crop cultivation.Then theres the agro chemicals used to protect the crops( ok, this is absent in organic cottons ) Right after that, it goes to hell as massive amounts of energy and piped water is used to clean the fibres. And the trampling continues when the naturally beige fibres are bleached, heavy metals added to clean them, formaldehyde used to add color brilliance. All these chemicals are flushed into the waters untreated, especially in the case of third world factories that make most of the world's clothing today.The environmental impact is devastating. The people impact from our point of view, is already being felt in our increasingly weakened immune systems and the rise of chronic diseases like asthma and allergies of every sort.

We had two choices. Beige everything or colored recycled fibres. We picked the recyled fibres for the added eco factor - reusing,reducing and recyling.