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Mineral Sweatshirt. Ochre edition

Name: Mineral Sweatshirt. Ochre edition
Brand: Vollebak
SKU: SWH048OCHXSM
Price: 103.00 GBP
Availability: InStock

Garment dyed with ochre, the world’s oldest pigment.

CHF 103 CHF 345 70% off

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Model is 5ft 11 / 180cm with a 38 inch / 97cm chest, and wears size Medium.

Garment dyed with 100% ochre mineral powder
Built with 55% organic hemp
Hemp combined with organic cotton for softness

As we continue to look for new, low impact ways to dye clothing, we’ve turned to the colouring tools of early man – minerals, rocks, and soils. Minerals don’t just tell the story of life on Earth, they also tell the story of colour. When our solar system settled into its current shape around 4.5 billion years ago, Earth was created by a series of galactic collisions. Tectonic plates began to form. And geological life and biological life fused together to create vast mineral deposits in the Earth’s upper crust. So when prehistoric man first picked up a prehistoric paintbrush, they turned to the ground around them. Today, instead of using those minerals to paint cave walls, we’re using them to dye clothing. Our Mineral Sweatshirt is garment dyed in a giant bath of ochre. There are only 2 by-products of this process – sediment, and water. Both of which can go straight back into nature.

Technical details

Material made in Portugal: 55% organic hemp, 45% organic cotton

Dyed with 100% ochre mineral powder

Soft and breathable

Natural stretch

Material weighs 440g/m2

Sweatshirt weighs 680 grams

Machine wash 30°C

Constructed in Portugal

Material made in Portugal: 55% organic hemp, 45% organic cotton

Dyed with 100% ochre mineral powder

Soft and breathable

Natural stretch

Material weighs 440g/m2

Sweatshirt weighs 680 grams

Machine wash 30°C

Constructed in Portugal

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Minerals tell the story of life on Earth

As we continue to look for new, low impact ways to dye clothing, we’ve turned to the colouring tools of early man – minerals, rocks, and soils. Minerals don’t just tell the story of life on Earth, they also tell the story of colour.

They also tell the story of colour

When our solar system settled into its current shape around 4.5 billion years ago, Earth was created by a series of galactic collisions. Tectonic plates began to form. And geological life and biological life fused together to create vast mineral deposits in the Earth’s upper crust. So when prehistoric man first picked up a prehistoric paintbrush, they turned to the minerals, rocks and soils around them. Today, instead of using those minerals to paint cave walls, we’re using them to dye clothing. And it's why this sweatshirt is garment dyed in a giant bath of ochre.

Made with a mineral called ochre

Ochre is a type of iron oxide known as an earth-based pigment. A mixture of ferric oxide, sand and clay, it’s formed in a surface, or near-the-surface environments where oxygen is present. Examples include boulders weathering on a hillside, sediments in lakes and rocks in contact with water heated by magma. The intensity of ochre’s colour is dictated by the amount of oxyhydroxide it contains which is a compound of iron, oxygen hydrogen.

Ochre is the world’s oldest pigment

Ochre is the world’s oldest pigment. In 2011 a 73,000 year old abstract sketch was discovered in a cave in South Africa. It was made using an ochre crayon and is considered the first known drawing in human history. Thousands of years later Ancient Egyptians used yellow ochre to symbolise perfection, indestructibility and eternal life.

It’s collected in Italy

Ochre’s colour varies from region to region, depending on whether the local clay is richer in yellow iron ore or red iron ore oxide. The ochre from Pozzuoli near Naples was salmon pink. The ochre from Tuscany was a reddish-brown colour known as terra di siena. Our ochre starts life in Italy, in an area that runs from Verona to Venice, and it’s yellow.

Garment dyed in ochre powder

After the raw ochre mineral is collected, it’s refined, refracted, and turned into a clean powder. To make the sweatshirt we then add the mineral powder to a vat of water and submerge the whole garment – a process called ‘garment dyeing.’ There are only 2 by-products of this process. Sediment, and water. Both of which can go straight back into nature.

It creates a softer sweatshirt with a softer colour

Most clothes today are piece-dyed, which means the fabric is dyed before it’s cut up and sewn together. Garment dyeing requires more time and more care, but it creates softer fabrics with softer colours. And it means that rather than harsh chemicals, we only need to use heat, time and pressure for the colour of the ochre to stick to the sweatshirt.

Minerals create a different kind of colour

Nearly all the colour you see in clothing today will have been created with petroleum-based dyes. But colour in clothing existed long before the chemical dyeing industry was invented. So we’ve gone back to the colour palette of early man. Because each sweatshirt is made using minerals made by nature, you might find small differences in colour across it. And because it’s garment dyed, every sweatshirt has a pre-worn look.

We need to rethink colour

We tend to think of the colour on our clothes as one thing. Something uniform, bold, and often bright. But this is created using highly synthetic processes. And the colours that nature produces aren’t like that. There are no crazy colours on cave walls because they simply didn’t exist. Dyeing clothing in minerals, rocks and soils is designed to help us rethink how colour can be made.