CREATIVE CORNER l sustainable quilting
to make a di erence. The Better Cotton Initiative is the
largest cotton sustainability programme in the world. It
provides training on more sustainable farming practises
to more than two million cotton farmers in 21 countries.
I’m happy to say that my chosen brand of thread, Aurifil,
supports this initiative and I plan to look out for this
symbol wherever possible from now on and ask my fabric
suppliers why they are not taking part. This is something
we can all do as consumers.
Unlike most fabric companies, digital printers
Spoonflower has a whole page about sustainability on
its website. Spoonflower’s pigment printing process
consumes very little water and the pigment inks are free
of restricted chemicals and mixed from four to eight
basic colours as the fabric is printed so, unlike screen
printing, there’s no mixing of colours in advance. Digital
printing is a more environmentally-friendly alternative
to screen printing, and though not quite as durable, it’s
clearly the future for the industry.
Despite the great number of resources, energy, and
water that cotton needs there is comfort in the fact that
natural fabrics can at least biodegrade and be renewed.
Meanwhile, the likes of polyester and nylon consume
just as many resources and continue to pollute after the
production process, including microplastic pollution in
oceans.Waste not, want not
As a shop owner I know how much plastic waste occurs.
Each time I get a fabric delivery, each bolt is separatelywrapped,andinmaterialswhichseemalmostimpossible
to recycle. I do understand that it could be potentially
more wasteful not to use plastic when shipping fabric,
however, many other quilting products do not need
plastic packaging. My new range of patterns will be sold
in brown paper bags with a printed info label on the
front to keep them completely plastic free. I was also
delighted that my issue of Today’s Quilter has now started
arriving in a paper envelope.
Aurifil made a fantastic step in the right direction last
year with the announcement that they are now plastic
neutral. They have partnered with the Plastic Bank, a
social enterprise that aims to clean up plastic waste from
our oceans while providing valuable opportunities for
people living in poverty. This will allow Aurifil to o set
an average yearly plastic production rate of 8,000kg
by supporting the collection and clearing of 8,000kg
of plastic from the oceans in areas of Haiti, Indonesia,
The Philippines, and Brazil. This is just the first step for
Aurifil and they will continue to work on reducing the
plastic used in their production processes.
Being a fabric store owner and wanting to encourage
less consumerism doesn’t exactly go hand in hand and
if everyone stopped buying fabric I would struggle to
pay the bills. But that is nothing compared to workers
in the developing nations who are completely dependent
on jobs in the cotton industry. It provides income for
more than 250 million people worldwide and employs
almost 7% of all labour in developing countries. We doIs this Fergus’s Future by Mags Scammell (detail)
showing her grandson finding plastic under a waveIs this Fergus’s Future by Mags Scammell,
president of the Edinburgh MQG