Ethical Fashion
Rapanui is an Eco-Fashion company from the Isle of Wight, that makes Organic, Ethical clothing using Renewable Energy with award-winning traceability. Rapanui is about making eco-fashion cool.
Rapanui Eco Latest
Feature...
Organic Cotton Clothing
For t-shirts and sweaters, the softness, breathability and comfort of Organic Cotton is unrivalled: Organic Clothing results in higher quality products that are softer and kind to skin.
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fibre that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants. The plant is a shrub native to tropical and subtropical regions around the world, including the Americas, Africa, and India. The fibre most often is spun into yarn or thread and used to make a soft, breathable textile, which is the most widely used natural-fibre cloth in clothing today.
It is a sad fact that growing conventional cotton for clothing uses more chemicals per unit area than any other crop and accounts in total for 16% of the world's pesticides. There are lots more reasons to move away from conventional cotton – although this makes for some upsetting reading.
A more positive and sustainable alternative, Organic cotton, is made from non genetically modified plants, that are to be grown without the use of any synthetic agricultural chemicals such as fertilizers or pesticides. Organic cotton is better for the environment, the climate and the people involved.
Unfortunately, less than 0.1% of global cotton production is Organic.
Why go organic?
Cotton growers who make the transition to organic farming practices expect not only to offer a healthier and cleaner product, but also to benefit the planet. Some of the contributions to the different ecosystems include:
• Protecting surface and groundwater quality (eliminating contaminants in surface runoff)
• Reduced risk in insect and disease control by replacing insecticide with the manipulation of ecosystems
• Long-term prevention of pests through beneficial habitat planting.
• Conservation of biodiversity
• Eliminate the use of toxic chemicals used in cotton
• Organically grown crops also yield soils with higher organic matter content, thicker topsoil depth, higher polysaccharide content, and lower modulus of rupture; therefore reducing considerably soil erosion.
We use Organic Cotton to make almost all of our clothing. For t-shirts and sweaters, the softness, breathability and comfort of Organic Cotton is unrivalled: Organic Clothing results in higher quality products that are softer and kind to skin.
Pest Traps replace
chemical pesticides
Biodiversity
In large plantations of Standard Cotton, there isn't a wide variety of plant species. This affects the variety of insect and animal species; instead of nature balancing out populations in a varied food chain, a monoculture exists that allows pests to thrive. Standard cotton farming techniques involve spraying quantities of synthetic chemical pesticides on the crop to keep pests under control.
Organic Cotton production involves replacing the synthetic pesticides and fertilisers with natural ones, then using crop rotation and mixed planting to encourage biodiversity.
Carbon Footprint of Organic Cotton
Nitrogen fertiliser is a source of emissions in conventional textile crop farming. To produce just one tonne takes one tonne of oil, seven tonnes of greenhouse gasses and one hundred tonnes of water. Organic farmers work with nature to feed the soil and control pests. By choosing organic, local and seasonal, we can significantly reduce our carbon footprint.
Water Conservation
Cotton is a thirsty plant, needing 20'000 litres of water per kg to grow; provided by irrigation. We grow ours in a valley, in India, where monsoon rains provide 95% of the water needed to grow the plant. Our water conservation ethos extends to the factory where a closed loop system filters and reuses 93% of all the waste water in the dyeing stage. A vast improvement on past efforts to service cotton fields, like the Aral Sea disaster.
Labour ethics and organic cotton
It is a sad fact that the conventional cotton industry relies on a high level of forced & child labour in poor working conditions for unreasonable pay.
*(Environmental Justice Foundation, ejfoundation.org, 2009).
Some organic cotton certification bodies also consider child labour and unethical labour practises as part of their auditing - We believe it's important to ensure the workers in the factory are taken care of too and source the majority of our lines from factories that subscribe to the code of labour practises set out by Fair Wear Foundation.
Features Pages
Link to this article
Comments
Bestselling Products...
Thunder Cloud T-shirt
This Thunder Cloud t-shirt was inspired by legendary British weather symbols...
£24.95
Save our Seas T-shirt
Our oceans are worth protecting. The Marine Conservation society has been...
£24.95
Leaf Classic T Shirt
People often ask us how our brand started. It's a hard question to answer...
£24.95
Revolutions t-shirt
This pattern, merging the Nuclear Radiation Warning logo to the symbol...
£24.95
Save our Seas Top
Our oceans are worth protecting. The Marine Conservation society has been...
£24.95
Wolfpack Top
We love making cool products that have a bit of a story, and as our customers...
£24.95
Whale Love
Whales, we all love them - but the last few years it seems like there'...
£24.95
Majestee
60 years on board without any major wipeouts, this t-shirt is a tribute...
£24.95
Men's Clothing
- Eco Pants & Socks
- Men's Bamboo T-shirts
- Sweats & Hoodies
- Organic T-shirts
- Polos & LS tees
- Men's Clearance
- Eco Friendly Shoes
- Men's accessories
- Met Office Clothing
- + All Men's Clothing
Connect
Women's Clothing
- Women's Accessories
- Sweats & Midlayers
- Tops & Vests
- Underwear & Socks
- Women's Clearance
- Women's Eco Footwear
- Women's Met Office
- + All Women's Clothing
About
Customer Care
Contact Us
Questions, feedback or visitors, here's what you need to get in...
Rapanui ®
1 High Street
Sandown
Isle of Wight
PO36 8LX
Registered Company 7071956
VAT No. 987 836541
Translate Website: Fr | De | Es | 日本