The material is highly eco-friendly

Mar 3, 2009 12:05 GMT  ·  By
Cloths made from bamboo are soft and offer an eco-friendly alternative to plastic ones
   Cloths made from bamboo are soft and offer an eco-friendly alternative to plastic ones

The preferred source of food for the Panda bears, bamboo, may soon be used to create eco-friendly cloths, as the wonderful plant has properties that other synthetic materials, as well as cotton, could only dream of. In addition, the bamboo fabric is very soft to the touch, and has a few extra anti-bacterial features than others. The trees grow extremely fast, sometimes even by one foot per day, and reach maturity in little than one year.

Also, they do not require pesticides or other fertilizers to grow, because the plant is basically a weed and develops as such. Therefore, the risk of contamination of the skin with these chemicals is inexistent. And making cloths out of the stuff actually works, Anne Kai, from Lacey, Washington, who owns a small factory, says.

She hand-dyes all the cloths she produces, and considers that the bamboo fabric is a pleasure to work with. To make sure that the dyes stay attached to the material, she first soaks the finished cloths in a mixture of soda ash and water, and then pastes the colors directly on top.

“The bamboo fabric holds the dyes really well. They don't start bleeding out after the first few washes,” she adds. But there is also a “dark side” to the material, as nothing can be 100 percent clean. In order to convert bamboo stalks into the fabric, dangerous chemicals have to be used, which are not entirely eco-friendly.

And, for the moment, all the fabric that is sent to the United States is made in a single factory in China. Now, researchers are looking into a less harmful way of converting the stalks into the fabric, one that would not require the use of the aforementioned chemicals.

“Bamboo isn't perfect. I just hope people become more aware of the products they are buying. I like to be as environmentally friendly as I can and use high-quality materials that are going to last. I'm not too good at marketing. I'm going to start by selling online,” Kai pinpoints. She hopes to attract the attention of environmentally-conscious clients, who are always looking for similar offers on the Internet.

If this method proves to work, then we could see a lot more cloths made from this resistant, yet bio-degradable fabric. Those that are made with plastic fibers take years to degrade into the soil, and can pollute it with the various chemicals they contain. They can also cause severe allergic reactions, whereas those made from bamboo or natural cotton or silk do not.