Silk

Indian Mulberry Silk

Each state in India is like a seperate country, with unique and specialised foods, languages, traditions and crafts. Kanartaka (the state in which we started our L.M journey) is famous for its silks. It produces around 45% of the countries mulberry silk.

Dinesh runs the silk mill that weaves the silk that we use for our silk styles. Silk has been apart of his family business for a long time. In 1945 Dinesh’s grandfather moved to Bangalore and set up the silk mill that stands here today.

It is passion that keeps Dinesh running the family business and working directly with him is so important to us. We have formed a relationship that allows for trust, transparency and honesty.

He has been able to take us to meet his reelers and the farmers from who he sources his silk yarn. We have been able to have conversations with those people and put a face to the fabric. It's allowed us to have a deeper appreciation and respect for the fabric, acknowledging the many steps that go into creating this product.

Why we love silk

(Besides the obvious - its luxurious hand feel.)

Low Waste :

Silk is considered to have a low water footprint and be almost zero waste. The boiled pupae get used as protein in chicken feed and the coarser cocoon threads are used in carpets. Every cocoon is unravelled and spun into yarn.

Biodegradable:

There is a reason why silk feels the way it does, it's created by nature. This also means that it is biodegradable and ensures that less textile waste builds up in landfills.

Low Chemical Inputs:

Silk worms feed on cultivated mulberry leaves. Mulberry trees require minimal pesticides and water. Additionally from the farm to the reelers there are no other chemical treatments undertaken on the yarns. Once the fabric has been woven, we dye our silk using AZO free, low impact dyes.

Community:

By tracing down our silk supply chain we developed a greater appreciation for the process, but also for how the whole village is supported by it. There is respect for every aspect of the process, from the farmers to the reelers and then the weavers, because this industry drives and supports the community.

COCOON TO CLOTH

Our Thoughts on the Silk Controversy

On our journey to connect with silk suppliers we looked into less harmful ways and alternative fabrications. The traditional silk process involves boiling the cocoons with the silk worm alive inside. Adhering to our values of honesty and acting authentically, here is some of the reasoning for why we use silk and what we learnt along the way.

Ahisma Silk also known as peace silk is the process where the moths either hatch naturally or the cocoon is cut open to release the moths so that they are no longer involved in the production process. When cut open however, the quality of the silk can be compromised as one cocoon is unravelled to produce one strand of silk.

We found out that there is no certification process to minimise the mistreatment of the worm or to monitor whether the moths hatch naturally, by force or if they are ready for hatching or not. The worms have been domesticated for thousands of years and for this reason some don't have the capacity to survive for long.

There are many interesting textile innovations that use the by-products from plants such as corn, rose petal, aloe vera or lotus to create new textiles. When we did a bit more research we found out that there are many different methods to extract the cellulose fibres used to make textiles and that often the most economical form can involve an extensive chemical process.

Our Opinions

It wasn't easy for us to rule out peace silks, but if we couldn't guarantee that the process wasn't harmful we decided that there may be better options. Instead, at this point we see greater value in partnering with a mill like Dinesh's that can offer transparency and helps support an entire local village while maintaining traditional techniques.

Silk as an agricultural product takes up very little space and is a high valued product. It has the potential to provide well for lower socio-economic villages.

We wanted to know what the extraction method was being used and what was involved in the process to make these innovative textiles before jumping on board and these details were often difficult to get from suppliers.

We decided that we didn't want to take the gamble of using chemicals in an unregulated system without further research. We also couldn't confirm that quality and durability of the fibres would match that of silk without sufficient testing beyond the capabilities of our small business.

As there aren't any chemical processes involved in extracting the yarn from cocoons, traditional silk with a transparent supplier made more sense for us at this stage.

We want to keep exploring and learning about new textiles and innovative processes before we commit to one of these alternative silk options.