Milk textile is a fabric made with the casein found in milk. It has been long praised for its softness and smoothness even though it is hard to create casein fiber.
In order to do this the casein is extracted and purified through a toxic chemical (sulphuric acid and formaldehyde) process transformed into yarn. A lot of milk is used in the process, but there have been improvements.
A German company, Qmilk has reinvented the process only using no more than two liters of milk per Kg of fiber while maintaining zero waste. The material is created at low temperatures therefore requiring less energy than other textile processes. The end result is 100 percent natural and as smooth as silk fabric. Milk textiles can be used to make socks, underwear, other forms of intimate apparel, clothing made from wool, and household textiles.
The Creation of Yarn
Yarn is a strand composed of fibers, filaments (individual fibers of extreme length), or other materials, either natural or synthetic, suitable for use in the construction of interlaced fabrics, such as woven or knitted types. The strand may consist of a number of fibers twisted together; a number of filaments grouped together but not twisted; a number of filaments twisted together; a single filament, called a monofilament, either with or without twist; or one or more strips made by dividing a sheet of material, such as paper or metal foil, and either twisted or untwisted. The properties of the yarn employed greatly influence the appearance, texture, and performance of the completed fabric.
Textile Industry Pollution
Textile mills generate one-fifth of the world's industrial water pollution and use 20,000 chemicals, many of them carcinogenic, to make clothes. Chinese textile factories alone produce about three billion tons of soot (air pollution linked to respiratory and heart disease) every year by burning coal for energy.
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