Sustainability is a mindset that should affect every decision you make, by just taking the time to consider a product all the way through we can create efficiencies that avoid waste, unnecessary transport, and allow savings that can enter into workers’ pockets or be reinvested into the environment or community. Some of the considerations that permeate our garments are our efforts to reduce unnecessary transport; to source natural materials with the lowest impact that we can pragmatically afford, to make sure our workers are paid fairly and care about reducing environmental impacts as much as we do; to avoid synthetics and plastics; and to completely avoid single-use plastics and products. We care about the effects of everything, from packaging to sourcing buttons, so as a company, we constantly reassess the facts to make sure that we are not working based on myths but working to actually reduce our impact. We believe in slow consumption, learning, curiosity and being brave. Sustainability isn’t a trend - it’s a mindset that is necessary for our future.

We believe in the power of manufacturing to change lives. Nutcracker has the goal of working with more and more artisans, small cooperatives and collectives to increase our community engagement and act as a form of impact investment. We have been building up relationships across the historic silk road with this goal in mind.

However, with the COVID-19 pandemic and our commitment to small-batch production, our focus at the moment is on working with suppliers and printers closer to home. 

Both our sampling and production is carried out with Phosphenes of London, specialists in high-end luxury garments and boutique production, who we trust implicitly and can visit quickly from our base in London. We share our aims of reducing our footprint and particularly eliminating waste. Rather than shipping samples back and forth, our creative director can be present on-site to see our garments come to life and work with the line managers to reduce any unnecessary waste. 

Responsive design and producers who care about their planetary impacts are at the heart of our brand. Every stage of production is designed to reduce waste, from conception to the cutting floor. Our designers work directly with our print experts to place prints, which ensures that our printing can be done to order and our lay plans are designed to reduce waste. We design new lay plans for each print run to reduce waste and adapt to input from our cutters. For instance, our eye masks are designed to fit into the gaps between garment pattern pieces and use piping from waste fabric rather than overlocking with polyester threads. Fabrics and Sourcing of Natural Materials We are shocked by fast fashion’s environmental and social impacts, so we are very conscious of reducing our contribution to the fashion industry’s global pollution and abuse. To mitigate our footprint, we strive to provide high quality garments, designed with natural materials of the highest standards available. We work with a limited pool of suppliers, factories and producers who we trust, are flexible and have small minimums to ensure less waste. This allows us to guarantee the provenance of our textiles.

Silk constitutes the bulk of our fabric consumption. Sourcing our silk directly through our silk manufacturers minimises our carbon footprint, since they order in much greater quantities, and rather than shipping small quantities from Asia regularly, we order per our usage from silk manufacturers in the UK and Italy; these manufacturers source from ethical mills who they have long-lasting relationships with in Europe, China, and India.

Necessarily sourced from Asia, the International Sericulture Commission estimates that 60% of all sericulture (silk farming) income flows back to farmers, creating a strong money flow from urban to rural areas and reducing the pressure of urbanisation. Women comprise an estimated 60% of the sericulture and silk industry workforce. Sericulture plays a key part in rural poverty alleviation projects and the Indian Silk Board estimates that about 57% of the gross value of silk fabrics flows back to its cocoon growers. Per Ecocult, all of silk’s by-products are integrated back into the local ecosystem and economic system. A mulberry tree’s fruits are edible, wood is used for timber or fuel, foliage is cattle-feed, extra waste is composted for fertiliser and low quality silk is used as filling in products like duvets. Sericin, which is recovered from the wastewater, is an additive in food, cosmetics, textiles, and pharmaceuticals. Where silk can cause the most environmental damage is in energy usage and processing. Silk farms are kept at a certain humidity and temperature (65°F). Because of hot climates in silk-producing regions, energy is needed for temperature and humidity control, as well as drying the cocoons after harvesting. This can be most cheaply provided by burning the waste mulberry wood as biofuel or, in many cases, solar energy since it is considered the most cost effective and reliable option. Our UK silk suppliers only use digital printing, which saves 70-80 litres per meter and further gains from waterless printing, where possible (please see the Fabric Treatment & Digital Printing section for more information). Our processors don’t simply stop at monitoring water and coating consumption, they ensure full compliance with the UK’s strict waste framework directive by paying for specialists to dispose of waste by-products. Our Italian and Indian silk suppliers produce and print under strict regulations and quality control. In India, in the Jharkland region, our silk is certified as organically produced and cruelty-free, with our supplier operating under the certifications of the World Fair Trade Organisation (WFTO), Global Organic Textile Standard (GOTS), Organic Content Standard (OCS) and the National Programme for Organic Production (NPOP). The process is plastic (crude-oil) free. Materials such as silicon and plastic boning, polyester mesh can-can, chemical adhesive-based fusing and pasting are avoided in the process by using alternative materials derived from natural resources like bamboo and cane. The machines themselves are increasingly powered by solar-cells and materials are transported using public-transport networks. The supplier operates as a form of rural co-operative, and as such, has a decentralised production allowing the silk farmers, spinners, and weavers to work directly from their own areas. All of these different units are well connected with the centralised headquarters, which reduces unnecessary transport.

Where possible, we use GOTS-certified organic cotton sourced from the UK and Egypt. We also source from the English Fine Cotton Company who have UK-based mills, responsible and transparent supply chains and sourcing based in California (where their water consumption is tightly controlled). 

It takes on average 10,000 litres of water to cultivate just one kilogram of raw cotton, that means the production of just one cotton T-shirt requires approximately 3,000 litres (according to the UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education). If an average person drinks 2 litres of water a day, it will take them 4.1 years to consume 3,000 litres of water. 

Eutrophication, which can be caused by over-fertilization, has a huge impact on agriculture and eco-systems, affecting air, soil and water quality. It is mainly caused by nutrient leaching and soil erosion, meaning that nutrients are removed from the cultivated system via water and soil. Strong soil protection measures applied in organically cultivated systems can prevent up to 90% of soil erosion. The water pollution impact of organic cotton has been shown to be 98% less than non-organic cotton production (per Water Footprint Network). We have focused on supplier certifications that guarantee less water wastage and support initiatives to invest in reducing wastage and pollution. A lifecycle analysis by PE International in 2014 found that organic cotton had around half the global warming potential of conventional cotton, 91% less use of fresh water from lakes and streams and approximately a third of the demand for energy. The average Global Warming Potential (GWP) of conventionally grown cotton is 1,808 kilograms of CO2 per 1,000 kilograms of cotton fibre produced. For organic cotton, with the certifications that we seek in our suppliers, the GWP is 978 kilograms of CO2 per 1,000 kilograms of cotton fibre, which is a GWP saving of 46%.

We think down to the small details and source traditional corozo nut and shell buttons rather than using plastic buttons. The corozo nuts are sourced from an indigenous co-operative in the Amazon rainforest which helps support their culture; the shells are sourced from mussels and oysters, which remove nitrogen as well as heavy metals from the waterways they live in. Fabric Treatments & Digital Printing Did you know that the volume of water used in conventional dyeing and textile print processes could fill the Mediterranean Sea every two years? The amount of water currently used, wasted and polluted is staggering. The industry shift towards digital printing helps to reduce dyeing’s environmental impact. One of the largest water usage reductions within fashion is from the switch to digital printing, with savings of 70-80 litres per meter printed compared to traditional methods. If these technologies were adopted worldwide, it would translate into a saving of over 2 trillion litres of water per annum or roughly double the annual consumption of water in the UK. On average a digital printing machine uses approximately 0.14 kW per meter printed, compared to traditional rotary printing’s 0.46 kW per meter printed. If this printing method was adopted worldwide, it would reduce the power requirement of the textile industry by three times the power consumption of the UK.

Digital printing does not need screens or plates, like the more traditional screen printing or rotary printing, requiring less setup equipment as it prints directly on fabrics (through precise application of the artwork); this wastes less surplus ink. All of our inks are certificated Azo dye free.

Our UK silk supplier ensures that any fabric wasted during the printing process is collected locally by a recycling specialist who shreds it and uses the resulting fibres as bioenergy, incinerating them to create heat and electricity. Plain fabric offcuts may also be donated to education and charity facilities.

We don’t use single-use plastics. Nutcracker has a simple principle - if it’s going to be thrown away, and we can’t do without it, we should find a way to reuse it or it should be able to go back to the earth with minimum effort. Our aim is to make something so beautiful that you would never want to throw it away. We believe in longevity, preserving our planet and carbon offsetting.

Avoiding over packaging is a principle we always try to enforce, as less is more. Instead of shipping boxes within boxes Nutcracker has designed one lightweight, uncoated mailer box from recycled cardboard, which is completely biodegradable and recyclable. 

We cut down on unnecessary transport. All of Nutcracker’s manufacturing, sampling and warehousing is based in London. Less packaging and less transit reduces our footprint, and what we can’t eliminate, we can offset.