It’s easy to feel virtuous using 100 percent cotton bed sheets. What could be more pure than bedding made from a natural product, with no artificial fibres?
Cotton is the world’s most commercially important fibre, crops taking up 89 million acres in 70 countries. It’s also the world’s most heavily pesticide-sprayed field crop. Despite being planted on only three percent of the world’s arable land, cotton accounts for an incredible 25 percent of global pesticide and herbicide use–about 350 million pounds a year.
Cotton is such a pesticide-dependent crop that a group of farmers in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, who were beset by the American bollworm last year, spent virtually their last money on chemicals to control the insects. When the pesticides failed, their crops failed and at least 110 despondent farmers committed suicide–by drinking the pesticides.
The negative consequences of the chemically-intensive cotton industry is a broad, international issue, but it has important local ramifications, too, extending all the way to the most intimate part of our homes, the bedroom. Decoding what goes into the manufacturing of bedding is a challenge in itself. Most sheets, for instance, are sprayed with formaldehyde to reduce wrinkling. “You can smell formaldehyde off gassing,” says Katherine Tiddens, owner of Terra Verde, a New York-based natural products retailer who specialies in organic bedding. “It’s a sensitizer, and it accumulates not only in bedding, but also in carpets, textiles, even lipstick and nail polish.”Even “natural” or “green” cotton sheets, offered by many major manufacturers, aren’t necessarily a safe bet because, although they may be dye- or formaldehyde-free, their base material is usually conventional, pesticide-intensive cotton.
“Organic cotton is grown without any of the 200 agricultural chemicals used in the standard process,” says Christine Nielson, founder of Coyuchi. Certified organic cotton is frequently rotated in compost-rich soil, and uses beneficial insects, rather than spraying, to control bugs, Nielson explains.
White sheets are created with certified european dyes, that meet the strict criteria of the largest textile certifying body in the world, Control Union.  Toxic chemicals like arsenic are sometimes used to defoliate the cotton plant so that cotton picking machines can come through.  It is common practise to ‘soften’ cotton fabric after it comes out of the loom with ingredients that may include formaldehyde.  They are obviously toxic chemicals but they’re cheap!  We use non-toxic softeners that are certified as organic, for the same process.
White sheets are bleached using hydrogen peroxide, an inert chemical that causes none of the damage associated with chlorine. Arsenic is used to defoliate the cotton plant so only the cotton boll is left making it easier for the picking machines to come through.
It is common practise to ‘soften’ cotton fabric after it comes out of the loom with harsh chemicals including formaldehyde. They are obviously toxic chemicals but they’re cheap!
ecoLinen uses non-toxic softeners that are certified as organic, for the same process.
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