When tresses are turned into textiles, you bet something extraordinary is in the knitting. Zsofia Kollar, co-founder of the Dutch startup, Human Material Loop, is the master weaver behind this outlandish yet groundbreaking story of revolutionising the fashion industry by spinning human hair into textiles.
Sounds a bit radical? That’s exactly Kollar’s intention. She believes drastic changes are required in the fashion production system to sustain the planet for future generations. A small step in this vein was the creation of three design prototypes made by the utilisation of waste human hair into high-performing outfits such as coats, jumpers and blazers.
The aim is to push brands to create garments out of the alternative medium, thereby reducing the impact of the imprudent use of synthetic fibres within the textile industry—the second-largest polluter after the oil sector. Minimising its usage is a significant first step towards alleviating the substantial global hair waste in landfills and incinerators. This, in turn, helps mitigate generation of harmful greenhouse gases, and subsequently climate change.
Created by transforming short hair into continuous threads and then spinning them into yarn, the biological fibres are dyed with natural pigments. They are incredibly warm too, claims Kollar. To prove the clothing’s insulation capacity, the startup created an outdoor coat, stuffed it with hair to provide thermal insulation and tested it out in a place as severely cold as Aconcagua, the highest mountain in Argentina. Needless to say, the experiment was a success.
Despite the obvious advantage, Kollar is aware of the taboos surrounding the idea of wearing human hair. She notes that even though both human hair and wool share the same protein fibre—keratin—people are hesitant about putting on something crafted from the former. With time and better awareness, however, things will change, she believes. After all, hair has proven its potential time and again.
For instance, ropes made of human hair played a crucial role in the construction of the Higashi Hongan-ji Temple in Kyoto, Japan. Centuries before that, people of what is now the Southwestern United States, knit socks with hair. As a lightweight, non-toxic, non-irritating, oil-absorbing material, it may one day be embraced and intricately woven into the very fabric of clothing. That’s certainly something to wrap your head around.