New Eco Trend: Bamboo Clothing

The newest trend in eco fashion is clothing made of bamboo.

First bamboo hit your floors, kitchen utensils and now your clothing. I have more than one reason to love bamboo, but is bamboo the perfect solution for ecological clothing or is this just hype?

I bought my first bamboo clothing this summer and I am impressed: my tees haven't shrunk or faded in the washes, they still look like new, and the tees feel cool even on the hottest days of summer. Bamboo is the new organic cotton and silk spun together - but even more ecological than organic cotton, and softer than silk. I am predicting bamboo clothing will become even more popular in the next couple of years.

Bamboo fabric is so soft, with a feel of silk or cashmere and ecologically better for the environment than organic cotton. Add other properties like antibacterial, hypoallergenic and ability to block UV rays, and you've just discovered the perfect natural fiber.

prAna Amaya dress 70$, available soon at prana.com

A few years back every store started offering organic cotton clothing and eco-clothing hit the mainstream with stores like Wal-mart offering their own organic cotton lines. While for vast majority of consumers anything "organic", "eco" or "green" qualify for making our eco-consciouses clean, the true tree huggers protest by telling the truth about fabric dyes or what the transportation from China does to our eco-system telling us even question products, which are marketed us as eco-friendly.

Now there is a similar type of discussion of bamboo.

There are concerns for chemical processing of bamboo if the fabric comes from China or any country outside the US, Canada or Europe. In order to know if the bamboo clothing you are buying is made in the most ecological way, you would have to ask every manufacturer. One indicator is, if the manufacturer is a member of OTA, Organic Trade Association, like Canadian Booda Bellie is. Booda Bellie makes bamboo and organic cotton clothing for children, but they are expanding to clothing for adults as well due the increasing demand of green clothing.

Booda Bellie Kimono Onesie 25$

It is amazing to think that such a soft material can originate from a tree! And with that comes one question the ecologists are asking - what about the process of turning hard bamboo stalks into silky fabric?

Unfortunately this process is not always as eco-friendly as possible, and disqualifies some of the bamboo products from being 100% ecological. There are two ways to process the bamboo into fiber for fabric - mechanically and chemically. The mechanical way is more time consuming, but ecologically friendly. As the bamboo fabrics have become more popular, many producers have started using chemicals, which is more cost-effective and faster.

But bamboo as a fabric still beats cotton in any given day in the ecological stand of view. Bamboo is the fastest growing plant in the world thanks to its water absorbing ability. Bamboo requires little pesticides and water, making it the number one candidate for the most ecological resource for making fabric.

However as bamboo became more sought after resource, the bamboo farmers started using questionable growing methods, sometimes even clear-cutting forests to make more space for growing bamboo. This is why it is important to question the origin of their fabrics from the bamboo clothing manufacturers.

Choose Happiness tee 32$, Tees for Change