Life in the city tends to make us blind to the effects of our consumption, particularly the harm of mass-production. Jorded is fundamentally an experiment meant to combat that: What will happen if a fashion company makes the most sustainable choice in everything they do? These are the initiatives we identified two years ago and the progress we've made so far.
Progress: 99%
Microplastics are shed from clothes made from synthetic fabrics, polyester being the main offender. These fabrics are seriously harmful to the environment and still more research backs up their harm to humans and animals too. Our clothes and packaging don't shed micro plastics because they are not made of plastic materials.
To reach 100% we need to replace our zippers that are currently made of recycled polyester as well as our bio-poly mailer bags.
We strive to limit CO2 emissions and the use of finite resources (especially water) that result from our production and the use of our products. At the moment, that means relying on fabrics and production methods that have the least impact on our planet. That's a bit vague, so we took the time to write more about our first products released as Collection One (read on for an idea of what follows after).
We're here for the environment, and we quickly realised we have to reduce the amount of CO2 in our atmosphere. Producing new clothing doesn't do that (and don't let anyone tell you different). But trees do!
We've paired up with One Tree Planted to plant trees, lots of them. For each item you buy, one tree gets planted. We consider this a minimum of what should be done by companies, and we're likely to expand on our carbon sink later on.
Progress: 95%
This was and remains the main idea behind Jorded; preventing the massive waste produced by the fashion industry. Currently, most clothes end up in landfills or are burned. The burning causes pollution which contributes to global warming while the landfills poison our environment, some items taking hundreds of years to degrade.
All of our clothes and packaging are made from biodegradable materials with a "least impact"-mindset.
To reach 100% we need to replace the sewing thread which is polyester (because it's the most durable thread) and our recycled polyester zippers.
Progress: 90%
There are a lot of chemicals involved in fashion. There's the problem of pesticide-use in agriculture and the toxicity of waste water from fabric production and treatment, both of which can poison land and rivers and cause great harm to those handling them.
We solve this by buying only GOTS-certified fabrics or Tencel. Tencel is made in an almost-closed loop, which means that 99% of the chemicals used in its production is recycled for the next batch, with waste water going directly to water treatment plants.
So why isn't this at 100%? Because there are still better ways of dyeing fabrics, for instance by using natural dyes or no dye at all. We're looking into that now, but it will take a while to reach a commercially viable solution.
Progress: 60 to 95% (we just don't know yet)
All clothes are made by hand. Most fabrics are crops that were farmed, harvested, spun, and dyed by someone. Fast fashion's need for low prices has put continual pressure on these people's salaries and working conditions. The people who work in this industry deserve our fairness, respect and protection.
This project will reach 100% completion when we know that everyone in our supply chain can live decent lives. To get there we need to become more involved in the very first steps of production, namely the agricultural part.
Progress: 0%
The fashion industry produces a lot of waste - clothes that are never sold and fabric that's never used. This is commonly referred to as deadstock. Instead of seeing it burned, our next project is to launch limited availability collections that are primary made of deadstock fabric.
We can design these much bolder than Collection One, and each of the deadstock garments that sell will be directly responsible for avoiding further CO2 emissions.
Progress: 5%
This project aims to recycle our garments at end-of-life. When we say recycling, we mean recycling, not downcycling - we want to turn our clothes into new clothes, not pillow stuffing. This requires investment into research and it is certainly not something that can happen tomorrow or next year, but it won't be long until we launch our take-back recycling programme!
We're already planning for this by producing garments that are 100% made of one material and of strong fibers, making it much easier to recycle when the time comes.
