Euronews: clothes made from lost hair can save the planet from emissions and debris planets in human hair material. Crafting clothes from loose or trimmed strands will help reduce carbon dioxide emissions from the production and transportation of goods, as well as reduce the amount of garbage from the fashion industry, writes Euronews.
About 72 million kilograms of human hair accumulates in Europe every year, which can clog and disable drainage systems. Collard came up with the idea to start Human Material Loop when she learned about the amount of waste.
According to the designer, human hair, unlike wool or cotton, is a material available all over the world. It does not need to be grown in special conditions or supplied from other countries, which makes it easy to organize production in any region and employ local workers. Plus, you don't have to transport fabric and pollute the planet with emissions. Waste from the production of things will also be minimized – this type of production allows you to make goods to order.
Collard noted that human hair has a similar structure to sheep or alpaca wool, but is much less harmful to the environment – it does not need to be treated with chemicals to remove blood and faeces, it only needs to be steamed before yarn forming. In addition, the receipt of the material is not associated with the cruel treatment of living beings.
The raw materials for future jumpers are collected by Human Material Loop in Dutch hairdressers, and then sent to a spinning mill in Italy. However, in order to reduce the carbon footprint, Kollar plans to open such enterprises in his country. The designer also expects to make the production of things waste-free: after wearing, the clothes can be used as a natural fertilizer – the threads from the hair during decomposition will be able to provide plants with nitrogen.
Fashion Revolution activists support the push for a closed production system and argue that the fashion industry is causing enormous environmental damage. Over the past 15 years, according to the organization, the volume of clothing production in the world has doubled – two-thirds of this mass is made from fibers based on fossil fuels and only one percent is recyclable. Most of the items end up in landfills or incinerated. In addition, the production of products takes a huge amount of resources, and they serve too little.
Earlier, the California-based startup MycoWorks presented an environmentally friendly analogue of natural animal skin for the production of clothing and accessories. This was the raw material based on fungal mycelium (the vegetative body of fungi and actinomycetes, consisting of thin branched filaments). According to experts, such skin does not differ in tactile sensations and external characteristics from beef or sheep, however, it is many times more durable and does not harm the planet.