What is vegan silk and why should you wear it?
Silk, just like leather, wool and fur, is a material that comes from animals – and it's a large-scale killer.
Silk is the fibre that silk worms weave to make the cocoons that they live in during their pupal stage, and silk-industry workers often boil or gas the cocoons in order to access the threads that the silk yarn will be spun from.
Worms are then boiled or gassed alive. An estimated 6.6 thousand worms are needed to make just one kilogram of silk.
In today's fashion industry, the material that most commonly replaces silk is polyester – a petroleum-based, non-renewable, non-biodegradable environmental hazard. Staggeringly, nearly
70 million barrels of oil are used in the production of polyester each year.
Tencel Vegan Silk
TENCEL™ is a brand under the Austrian company Lenzing, and produces two materials that are often described as vegan silk. TENCEL™ lyocell and TENCEL™ modal fibres are becoming much-used textiles in sustainable fashion.
They are both plant-based fibres derived from wood pulp cellulose from certified sustainable forests.
To minimise waste, they're also made using closed-loop technology, meaning that resources such as water and chemicals are re-used.
TENCEL™ fibres create a vegan silk that is strong, highly resistant to wear and wrinkle-free – and also biodegradable. Several Immaculate brands use both Lyocell and Modal for their vegan silk collections, including Komodo and Neu Nomads.
Cupro
Cupro comes from cotton linter – a part of the cotton plant that otherwise is wasted in cotton production, making cupro a by-product. As a vegan silk it drapes easily and has a soft, flowing texture reminiscent of silk. Immaculate brand Komodo uses Cupro for their beautiful dresses, jumpsuits and shirts.
LENZING Ecovero
Material company LENZING has developed Ecovero, a vegan silk made with natural, renewable fibres derived from wood from sustainable forests.
This viscose material uses 50% less water and generates half the emissions of traditional viscose. It has a soft, silk-like texture and is easy to wash. Brands using it include Baukjen.