Hemp Facts

Why Hemp?

There are a dozen reasons a. ell design & atelier chooses hemp fabrics as a palette. For one, it’s easy to work with and comes in amazing silk, tencel and bamboo blends. Hemp is a pesticide and fungicide — it’s a natural disease and bug repellent.  Hemp is more durable than cotton and grown with far less chemicals. Cotton crops in the United States occupy 1% of the country’s farmland but use 50% of all pesticides according to www.hempfarm.org.

Hemp is considered sustainable because it doesn’t zap the soil of nutrients, it actually feeds the soil. Another tantalizing feature is hemp’s luxurious texture, and the fact that it is also four times stronger than cotton. According to www.hempfacts.com, the fabric softens with each washing, without fiber degradation. In other words, hemp doesn’t wear out, it wears in.

More Interesting Hemp Facts:

• In 1853, the first pair of Levi’s jeans was made. They were made of hemp.

• The “Columbia History of the World” states that the oldest relic of human industry is a piece of Mesopotamian hemp fabric dating back to approximately 8,000B.C.

• Industrial usage of hemp dates back 12,000 years.

• Presidents Washington and Jefferson grew hemp for industrial use

• The Declaration of Independence released on July 4, 1776 was written on hemp paper.

• Van Gogh and Rembrandt painted on hemp canvases

• Hemp is rot-, mold-, drought- and pest-resistant.

• Hemp is an excellent rotation crop, as it replaces nutrients in the soil.

• Hemp fiber board is twice as strong as wood fiber board.

• There are more than 25,000 different products made from hemp.

• Hemp is the number one biomass producer on Earth producing 10 tons per acre in approximately four months.

• Hemp out-produces cotton three to one.