WOMEN'S KNITTED CARDIGAN ALVA OLTREMARE

With the right care, you can wear your new favorite pieces for a long time while not only conserving resources but also protecting your clothing. And the best part? You don’t need to wash them nearly as often as you might think!

Clothing made from wood fibers in particular, but also wool, offers natural benefits: Both materials have antibacterial properties and quickly release moisture back into the air. This deprives bacteria of the conditions they need to thrive, prevents odors, and keeps your clothes fresh for longer. Washing less often not only means less effort, but also extends the life of your clothing—which, by the way, applies to all the other materials in your wardrobe too!

A quick note: Our garments containing wool need to be cared for differently than, for example, our WoodShirts.

For clothing made from recycled wool, the rule is: air it out instead of washing it! Wool largely cleans itself by neutralizing odors and absorbing and releasing moisture. If you do need to wash your wool garments, we recommend washing them by hand at a low temperature to protect the fibers.

The right care for a long service life

Even though our clothing stays fresh for longer, it will eventually need to go in the washing machine. To help you enjoy your sweaters and shirts for as long as possible, we recommend these environmentally friendly care tips:

• Wash at 30 degrees
  
  Gentle temperatures are entirely sufficient to get your clothes clean. This not only protects the fibers but also saves energy.
• Use a low spin cycle
  
  Low spin speeds protect delicate fibers and reduce wear and tear.
• No fabric softener or tumble dryer
  
  Wood fibers, organic cotton, and recycled cotton do not need fabric softener. They are naturally soft and comfortable to wear. And because our materials quickly release moisture back into the air, your clothes also dry in a short time when air-dried—so you can skip the dryer. Tumble dryers also unfortunately shorten the lifespan of your favorite pieces.

We ship your order within Germany using DHL GoGreen. We also deliver to many other countries. You can find out which ones, exactly how shipping costs are calculated, and the order value from which they are waived here.

Does an item not fit, or do you not like the color? No problem at all—we have a returns portal for situations like these. Here you can find out how to send an item back to us and which conditions you need to observe.

What makes our clothing so special, on the one hand, is the unique feel and distinctive properties of wood fibers, and on the other, our environmentally friendly production. But besides wood, we also use other sustainable fibers for our favorite pieces.

Here is an overview:

Wood fibers

1. Production

By using wood, we rely on a raw material that is also native to our region, avoiding long transportation routes. The wood used for our environmentally friendly clothing also comes exclusively from sustainable forestry. Compared with cotton, using wood is more environmentally friendly in many respects:

• Neither additional fertilizers nor large amounts of irrigation water are needed: for example, we save 1,000 liters of water with just one WoodShirt
• 3–4 times less land is needed to achieve the same fiber yield as with cotton
• During the production of our wood fiber, CO² emissions can be reduced twentyfold
• Fiber production takes place in a closed-loop process using an organic solvent that is recycled again and again.

You can read more about the benefits of producing our wood fiber here.

2. Properties

Wood fibers, in our case almost exclusively Lyocell, not only feel great against the skin; they also have many positive properties:

• Because they absorb moisture quickly, wood fibers help regulate temperature. They therefore keep you cool in summer and warm in winter
• Because wood fibers wick away moisture more effectively, they inhibit bacterial growth and give wood-based clothing antibacterial properties. This means it stays fresh for longer
• The smooth structure of wood fibers creates a silky-soft feel, resulting in less friction against the skin and helping to prevent itching and irritation

Organic cotton

In our wood-based clothing, we usually use a small proportion of organic cotton to offer women and men perfect comfort. Wood fiber alone produces a fabric that is far too silky and, without the right structure, drapes very loosely, making it generally unsuitable for men. By using organic cotton, however, we can give our wood-based clothing greater stability and ensure an optimal feel.

It is very important to us that only cotton from certified organic cultivation is used. This allows us to avoid chemical pesticides and fertilizers. In addition, organic cotton requires less water to produce than conventional cotton.

Among other sources, we have used organic cotton from Greece, India, and Tanzania. In general, however, we always try to choose the shortest possible transportation routes, while recognizing that cotton does not grow in our climate zone.

Recycled cotton

Another component of our sustainable collections is the use of recycled cotton. Instead of consuming new resources, we use fibers from old textiles and production scraps to create high-quality fabric for our garments. However, we only use recycled cotton in a blend. So why don't we use 100% recycled cotton? During the recycling process, the cotton fibers become shorter, which can affect their durability and strength. To compensate for this while ensuring high quality, we combine recycled cotton, among other fibers, with cotton. This allows us to create a long-lasting favorite piece for you that helps reduce waste and conserve resources.

Recycled polyester

We mainly use recycled polyester in our performance and sports shirts. Recycled polyester is made from old plastic bottles and other plastic waste, which is processed into new, high-performance fibers. These closed fibers cannot absorb moisture. In sports shirts, they ensure on the inside that moisture is quickly transported away from the body and can be absorbed and released again by the wood fiber on the outside. The result is a performance fabric that is breathable, temperature-regulating, and environmentally friendly at the same time. Using recycled materials also helps protect the environment, as producing recycled polyester requires significantly less energy than producing new polyester.

Recycled wool

We use recycled wool in some of our favorite pieces. Instead of producing new wool fibers, we upcycle old wool textiles and production waste, carefully processing them into new, high-quality yarns. This process not only saves raw materials but also significantly reduces the energy and water consumption normally required to produce new wool. Recycled wool offers the same natural properties as virgin wool—it is breathable, temperature-regulating, and incredibly warm—all with a smaller environmental footprint.