Are there vegan sustainable fabrics?

Veganism is becoming a trending topic and is on its way to reaching a wider audience regarding food and other products. To keep the topic a little closer to home, we’d like to educate you on veganism in relation to clothing. What exactly is veganism? And what are the reasons for choosing a vegan option?

Veganism is defined as “a lifestyle which refrains, as far as is practicable, from all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing, or other purposes“. People who choose to follow a vegan lifestyle often do so for their health, the environment and/or animal welfare. 

When it comes to clothing, veganism means that the items do not contain or use animal-derived materials. The use of animals for our daily products and/or foodstuffs has a major, negative impact on our planet in terms of nature and climate. By choosing vegan alternatives, you are also choosing a sustainable option.

How do you go about this?

It starts with recognising which substances are vegan and which are not. Of the fabrics we make at DuurzameStoffen.nl there are a lot of vegan options among them. These are the fabrics that contain fibres from recycled/ virgin cotton, linen, hemp, viscose and/or recycled PET. In short, fabrics made from plant or synthetic materials are vegan options. We have now also added a handy filter on our webshop with options for vegan fabrics. So be sure to have a look!

If a fabric contains the following yarns: wool, felt, leather, silk, suede, fur, down and/or feathers, animal materials are used and it is not a vegan fabric. In addition to the use of animal fibres, animal substances may also have been used in the production of, for example, the dyeing process of the textiles. We do not dye our recycled yarns for environmental reasons. Moreover, it is not necessary because the recycled yarns often already have deep colours.

At DuurzameStoffen.nl we make our fabrics as sustainable as possible by buying recycled yarns and producing them in Enschede. Many of our fabrics are vegan. A selection can be found below: