Hemp vs Organic Cotton: Why Hemp Leads, and What "Organic" Doesn't Test For

Most of our pieces are a blend of hemp and organic cotton. Organic cotton is soft, breathable, and a world better than the conventional kind. But it doesn't perform like hemp. And it doesn't heal the ground it grows in.

Hemp is our hero fabric. Organic cotton plays a supporting role.

Here's the part most brands skip: "organic" is a claim you have to trust on paper. We wanted to know what that paper actually promises, and where it runs out. So we went and found out.

How Hemp Grows

90 days. Ready to harvest. Faster than almost any fibre crop on the planet.

No pesticides. Hemp is naturally pest resistant. Nothing toxic goes on it, or into the ground it's grown in.

Deep roots. They aerate the soil, prevent erosion, and feed microbial life while the plant is still standing.

Carbon negative while it grows. Hemp absorbs more CO2 during its growing phase than it takes to produce.

Leaves the soil better than it found it. More nutrients in the ground after harvest than before.

How Cotton Grows

5-6  months.  About twice as long in the ground as hemp.

Up to 20,000 litres of water per kilo. Hemp needs 2,000-2,700L/kg.

Extractive by nature. Cotton takes from the soil rather than returning to it, organic or not.

Conventional cotton accounts for 4.7% of the world's pesticide use and 10% of insecticides, on 2 to 3% of the world's farmland.

Organic cotton avoids the chemicals. It's a much better option than conventional cotton however, it doesn't feed the soil the way hemp does.

What "Organic" Actually Promises (and What It Doesn't)

Organic cotton's biggest certification, GOTS, is a genuinely rigorous standard. It sets hard limits on toxic chemicals, wastewater treatment, and labour conditions all the way through processing. That's real, and it's worth something.

But here's the part that doesn't make it onto the swing tag: GOTS verifies a fibre's organic origin mostly through paperwork, called Transaction Certificates, plus periodic sampling before ginning. It is not molecular testing of every batch of yarn that ends up in a finished garment. Once raw cotton is spun and blended, telling organic from conventional by eye, or by touch, is not possible. The system relies on the documentation trail holding up.

In 2020, it didn't. GOTS' own accreditation body uncovered roughly 20,000 metric tonnes of cotton certified organic in India on forged Transaction Certificates, complete with fake QR codes and a cloned government website. India grows more than half the world's organic cotton, so this wasn't a fringe case. GOTS has since tightened how incoming certificates are checked. But the gap it closed is instructive: a paper trail is only as strong as the paper.

We still choose GOTS-certified organic cotton in our blended fabric, because a documented, audited system beats no system at all. We're just not going to pretend it means every fibre has been tested. It means the paperwork checked out.

Hemp sidesteps the whole exercise. It doesn't need a certificate proving nobody sprayed it, because the plant is structurally resistant to the pests that make spraying necessary in the first place. There's less to falsify when the growing method doesn't depend on a chemical input to begin with.

Why Hemp Leads

2-3 x stronger than cotton. Twice the tensile strength.

Naturally antibacterial. Fresher between wears.

Softens with age. Doesn't degrade with washing, the way cotton can.

UV resistant. Hemp fibres are UV resistant which is why they were used for centuries ffor ship sails.

Thermoregulating. Cool in summer, warm in winter.

Gives back to the environment: Rejuvenates soil, uses no pesticides, uses less water and sequesters CO2 with more efficiency than trees.

What People Ask Us

Is it scratchy? No. Hemp softens even more with wash and wear becoming beautifully soft over time.

Is it breathable? Yes. Hemp does not trap sweat. Moisture passes through the fibres. This means hemp fabrics don't develop odour like synthetic fabrics do.

Does it shrink?
Our garments are pre-shrunk so there will be less than 5% shrinkage after wash if any at all.

What happens to it at the end of its life?
Our 100% hemp and organic cotton pieces, like the hoodie and joggers, are fully biodegradable and break down in a matter of months under the right conditions. Our stretch styles include a small amount of spandex for movement, so they're not fully biodegradable, but they're built to outlast fast fashion many times over before that's even a question.

Is it good for sensitive skin?
Many people with sensitive skin find hemp gentler than synthetic fabrics. It's breathable and naturally antibacterial, without the synthetic finishes that can irritate.