Material Categories
Material families described by composition, typical use and documented limits, so a category can be judged before individual products are compared.
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PHA biopolymer
Genuinely degradable, but the certificate almost always specifies industrial composting. If no facility in your customer's market accepts the item, the property is real and the outcome is unchanged, so check the disposal route…
Last verified 2026-08-22 -
Ocean-bound plastic
The term means collected within a set distance of a waterway in an area without waste management; it does not mean recovered from the sea, and the two are used interchangeably in marketing. Ask…
Last verified 2026-08-22 -
Bamboo fibre
The highest regulatory risk here. Most of it is chemically regenerated viscose, and regulators have acted against brands labelling that fabric simply as bamboo; unless the fibre is mechanically processed bamboo linen, the correct…
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Jute
Testing costs more than the material is worth, so a large share of suppliers hold no certificate at all. That absence is not evidence of a problem, but it moves the substantiation burden onto…
Last verified 2026-08-22 -
Hemp fabric
The low agricultural input is the strongest and best-documented part of the case, but the impact concentrates in retting and softening — the stage a supplier's certificate rarely covers. Stiff hand at low cost…
Last verified 2026-08-22 -
Lyocell
A generic fibre class, not a brand: the closed-loop solvent-recovery rates published by branded producers do not transfer to an uncertified mill, so ask for its own figure. FSC covers pulp origin, not solvent…
Last verified 2026-08-22 -
Recycled cotton
Mechanical recycling shortens the fibre, so it is almost always blended — commonly with rPET. That blend is what you are buying, and a '100% recycled' claim on such a fabric describes the recycled…
Last verified 2026-08-22 -
Grape-marc sheet
The polymer matrix usually accounts for most of the weight, as with other by-product sheets. Watch for REACH compliance being offered in place of a bio-content figure: the two answer different questions, and only…
Last verified 2026-08-22 -
Recycled leather
Leather fibre bonded with a polymer binder: both percentages matter and suppliers usually quote only the leather one. An LWG certificate rates the tannery that produced the source fibre, not the bonded sheet you…
Last verified 2026-08-22 -
Recycled PVB
Recovered from the interlayer of laminated glass, so the feedstock is traceable and supply follows an industrial stream rather than a harvest — steadier than most novel materials. It is a plastic, though: no…
Last verified 2026-08-22