Tomorrow is World Environment Day, and the theme this year is beating plastic pollution.
Many of us already do our part by bringing our own totes for grocery runs, hauling our reusable coffee cups and water bottles, and curating that "bag of bags" under the sink (you know the one).
However, it's also an opportune time to air the dirty laundry lurking inside our wardrobes. Specifically the kind made from polyester.
P.E.T. PEEVE
More formally known as polyethylene terephthalate (PET for short) and derived from petroleum, it's plastic by a different name. It's so cheap to produce - especially when you ignore the environmental and ethical costs - that over half of all clothing sold in Australia is now made from it.
However, a single polyester t-shirt has a high environmental cost, with a carbon footprint over 20kg - or 100x its weight - in CO2 emissions. Worse, when we do the laundry a single wash can release several million microplastic fibres. Then when it's time to get rid of it, over 300,000 tonnes of clothing is dumped in Australian landfills every year, leaching microplastics into our drinking water for hundreds of years to come.
It's enough to make us figuratively and literally sick. That's why Citizen Wolf has made it easy to clean up your closet and keep it plastic free.
Natural fibres only
We use only sustainably sourced and certified natural fibres - cotton, hemp, linen and unmulesed merino wool. They're breathable, biodegradable, and contain no nasty chemical surprises.
Plastic-free buttons
Most brands use plastic buttons as they're a small detail that most consumers won't notice. Instead, all our buttons are made from Corozo nuts, which are harvested after naturally falling from the Tagua palm tree, then shaped, laser etched and dyed to match our fabric.
Compostable packaging
All our orders are shipped with biodegradable satchels and printing labels derived from corn. Our minimal packaging is a simple A4 sized insert to protect your garments during delivery, made from recycled cardboard.
So once you've received your new favourite clothes, the earthworms can also get a treat in the compost.
Free repairs
The most sustainable clothes are the ones you already own. That's why we'll happily repair any garment you've ordered from us for free, for as long as it can be repaired. So you can save money while saving the planet. Win-win.
Zero Waste
We only make garments on demand, so we already eliminate the over-production that's at the heart of the fast fashion model. We take it another step further by upcycling our fabric offcuts into our Zero Waste accessories range.
Take back program
As we only use natural fibres, we can take back your old CW Tees and combine them with our factory offcuts for cleaning, shredding and converting into new recycled cotton fabric. We're also an active member of Seamless, advocating for the Australian fashion industry to take stewardship of clothes made for the entire life of that garment so this can be the norm, rather than the exception.
There's no simple solution that's going to solve our complex global problems in one swoop, but World Environment Day isn't about perfection. It's about all of us taking small tangible actions in the right direction to ensure that we - and the generations that come after us - still have a healthy environment we can all thrive in.