Saint Basics
Everyone deserves a bit of feel-good every day. That is why Saint Basics makes super-soft basics from natural substances such as eucalyptus and organic cotton. Saint Basics products are 95% more environmentally friendly than ordinary products. And 100% free of pesticides, sweatshops, child labor and unfair trade.
Most of the clothing is made from eucalyptus which is about 95% more eco-friendly to produce than cotton and has many great qualities: it's anti-bacterial, breathable, moisture repellent, and silky soft to the touch. Perfect for underwear, sports wear, loungewear etc. At Saint Basics they make sure everyone involved in the production is paid a fair wage. The eucalyptus used in Saint Basics´ pieces mainly come from eucalyptus wood from FSC-managed forests in South Africa. The eucalyptus tree grows rapidly, its land use is 22% compared to cotton and its water consumption is 4% compared to cotton, so it is a much better alternative to make fabrics out of. The fabric made from eucalyptus is TENCEL® lyocell, made by Lenzing near Salzburg in Austria. It is the most environmentally friendly textile fiber that exists, softer than silk, cooler than cotton and stronger and more durable than bamboo. The fiber has microscopic channels that allow the moisture of your body to evaporate quickly. As a result, bacteria can hardly develop and you stay nice and fresh. Lenzing once started as a paper mill, but switched to cellulose fibers for the textile industry decades ago. Their innovative TENCEL® lyocell fiber dates back to the 1990s but is now becoming more popular in the fashion world. Saint Basics is one of the few brands that apply it for design underwear. There is a big difference between TENCEL® lyocell and other types of lyocell. It is the only fiber that is made in a sustainable, zero waste process (Lenzing is the only company that does this). In order to guarantee you as a consumer that you are dealing with the real stuff, every quantity of fabric produced by Saint Basics is inspected and certified by Lenzing. The fiber is made by dissolving wood pulp with a biological agent (amine oxide) in a closed system. 99.5% of the solvent is reused. No aggressive agents are used such as sulfuric acid (as is the case with bamboo and other regions).
Saint Basics also uses organic cotton, coming from the area around Aydin in western Turkey, on the Aegean coast. The cotton there has a long fiber - the longer the fiber, the softer the fabric. The cotton area around Aydin, where the soil is fertile and the climate humid, started to focus on organic cultivation in the 1990s. The further east you go and the drier the climate, the shorter and harder the cotton fibers become. Cotton is a thirsty plant. For example, a kilo of cotton from India uses 21,000 liters of water. In Aydin this number is around 6,000 liters per kilo. Not a small number, but 70% less than with cotton from warmer, drier areas. Saint Basics cotton is grown on GOTS-certified plantations, meaning no use of pesticides, fertilizers and other chemicals. "Working with nature, not against it" is the principle behind organic cultivation. Organic farmers rely on natural crop rotation. In this way the fields are kept fertile in an ecological way and insects and diseases are controlled by natural means.
After processing the bales are shipped to spinning mills, where the fiber is carded and spun into yarns by Impetus, a production factory near Barcelos, in Portugal, where knitting, dyeing and finishing takes place. Of course, this entire follow-up process is 100% free of sweatshops, child labor and unfair trade. The cotton fibers used by Saint Basics are so long, they normally don´t come loose from the yarn. This quality is called 'anti-pilling' and ensures that the fabric does not fluff - even after frequent washing! The fabric produced goes to the paint house for staining and stabilization. First the fabric gets a fixing treatment so that the elastane is not damaged during the dyeing process. Our basics, including the white, are not bleached but dyed with paint that meets the strict GOTS* standard. Part of the dyeing process is heating with steam and stretching the fabric in all directions, so that you will hardly get any shrinkage or twisting later. This also ensures that the fabric is well distributed (no thin spots that can easily wear out) and it also determines the final weight of the fabric. The end result is a beautiful, soft fabric of a constant and robust quality. Because they use a heavier quality fabric and a more luxurious knitting technique than most other brands, the products last a long time.
For most of the fabrics and the organic cotton, a mix of 95% natural yarns and 5% elastane is used. Elastane gives the clothes a nice fit and contributes to the wearing comfort. It is not in itself an ecological material, but it does ensure that your clothes stay in shape much longer. And that makes it sustainable again. Moreover, the R & D department of Impetus is working on a biodegradable variant of elastane, which Saint Basics hope to introduce soon.
The sewing of the clothing is also done in Portugal at Impetus. Some 180 people work in the sewing workshop, who never perform the same task for more than 3 hours, and everyone gets a fair wage. Almost everyone participates in the daily, voluntary fitness routine. Not only to stay smooth and healthy, but also for fun! You can also see this in the staff restaurant, where about 300 meals are served every day. Impetus takes good care of its employees but also of the environment. The factory has its own water treatment plant, uses biomass to produce hot water and generates 20% of its energy with solar panels. Recently, 80% of company cars were replaced by electric vehicles, which are being charged with their own power supply. In addition, the company does a lot of sustainable innovation.
*GOTS is a strict quality mark for the production of clothing. A textile product with the GOTS label 'organic' must contain at least 95% certified organic fibers. The remaining 5% may be synthetic or non-organic, but not of the same fiber as the biological part.
Based: The Hague, The Netherlands.
Ships to: Worldwide. Most countries are listed on our website, and we can ship on request to countries not listed.
Products: Underwear, T-shirts, and some lovely lounge pants. We are working on expanding our collection, and hope we'll be able to tell you more soon!
Mission: To make feelgood basics. We believe everyone deserves that little bit of feelgood, every day. By making basics that are incredibly sustainable, fair trade, and comfortable, we can offer you something you can truly wear with pride. This way, making the world a better place can be as easy as putting on your underwear, and you can start every day knowing you've done something to help. It feels good to be a Saint!
Vision: A better clothing industry, one that is kind to mother nature as well as its employees. A world in which sustainable clothing is affordable for everyone, people get fair wages and safe working environments, and we get better clothing that we can truly love. If we all contribute a little bit, and are a little more aware of our daily choices, we can make that happen. Our vision is a community of Saints all working towards this goal, because it feels good. It feels good to be part of a community, it feels good to help planet earth and each other, it feels good to wear our clothes.
