Prince Charles Has A Plan To Help The Wool Industry

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed)
Jan 25th 2010 at 10:02PM

Britain's royal family wears a lot of wool, always has. Now Prince Charles, long known for his eco-minded focus, is turning his attention to the wool industry. The London Times says that the Prince of Wales is looking to create a new green label for wool products. Part of the initiative would include Wool Week, taking place before London's Fashion Week in September and promoting wool as a fashionable option for winter wardrobes. The wool week would be backed by Marks and Spencer.

Wool has fallen out of fashion in recent years and the price of wool has declined. The Prince hopes his efforts will help make wool more popular once again for both clothing and carpet and rugs. Wool has a bad reputation as being bulky and itchy but the new push for wool plans to highlight the green benefits and beauty of wool compared to synthetic materials. Modern wool fabrics are also sleeker and softer and are being used in more innovative ways by top designers showing up in traditional Savile Row suits but also in wool bags from Marni and trendier pieces from Burberry and Paul Smith.

The Prince has his own organic flock of sheep and is aware of how lowering wool prices have affected farmers. British wool competes with wool from Australia, New Zealand and China among other countries.

This initiative dovetails with the British Wool Marketing Board's 'Naturally Green' campaign. A recent environmental Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) report found that the impact of British wool on the environment is measurably less than either nylon or polypropylene fibers and concludes that the sustainability of scoured British wool production is much better than that of polypropylene and nylon fiber productions. The British Wool Marketing Board wants manufacturers and retailers to consider British wool as their first choice for carpet.

Tags: british wool, BritishWool, prince charles, PrinceCharles, wool, wool industry, WoolIndustry