Why I bother
More than half of the fiber made in the world today is polyester. Polyester, nylon and acrylic are all plastics.
They shed tiny fibers every time they're worn and washed. Those fibers sit against your skin, float around the house and go down the drain.
Linen, wool, cotton and silk don't. They breathe, they soften with age, and people have dressed in them for thousands of years. They've just gotten hard to find, so I do the looking for you.
How the shop works
Pieces I've found at thrift shops and on clearance racks, checked by hand. You buy them here and I ship them myself from my own stock.
Specific items at other stores that pass the test. You'll buy them on the store's own site.
Whole brands that work in real fibers, with notes on which of their pieces to skip.
How I count
A fabric label only describes the cloth. It leaves out the thread, the elastic and the zipper, so a shirt labeled 100% cotton is almost always sewn with polyester thread. I look at the whole garment and give it one of four numbers.
Cotton, linen or silk thread. Buttons of shell, wood, nut or metal. No elastic, or natural rubber only.
Ordinary polyester thread and a care label. Maybe a few plastic buttons or a short zipper.
A little elastic, like the cuffs or part of the back waist.
A full elastic waistband, or elastic along with a long zipper.
The numbers are careful estimates from how each piece is made, not lab measurements. Viscose and rayon come from wood pulp and hold no plastic, but they're heavily processed, so the shop gives them their own filter.
Takes about a minute
Works in any store, thrift or otherwise.