Rabbit & Wren is deeply committed to protecting our natural world. We focus on natural materials and sustainable practices, so you can feel good about our products!
Below, we’ve outlined some of the steps we are taking towards sustainable practices.
Sustainable Printmaking
Calculating the environmental impact of printmaking is complex. At Rabbit & Wren, we prefer the overall life cycle of water-based, water-soluble ink, which contains no plastics (and therefore won’t produce microplastics later on). This means our cleanup can be done without solvents – we use a gentle environmentally-friendly degreaser. We take steps to reduce the water we use and to limit the ink that goes into the water system.
Materials
Rabbit & Wren uses natural fibers in our products and packaging – wool, cotton, and paper.
Felting wool comes from LivingFelt.com, a US company committed to humane and earth-friendly practices.
Tea towels come from a small US company, who works with small mills and farms throughout the world. Our supplier shares our commitment to holistic and sustainable production practices.
Zipper bags come from a fair-trade certified company and are made with organic cotton.
Our new cards will be printed on cotton paper. (We still have some cards printed on our older, non-recycled stock.) Cotton paper is made from waste that is generated by the textile industry.
Plastic-free Packaging
Did you know that 40% of all plastic produced is used for packaging? All our packaging is free of conventional plastics. Most of our products are packaged with only cardboard tags and cotton string. We use compostable sleeves made of plant-based PLA to protect our individual cards. We ship exclusively in re-used boxes saved from the waste stream, and we use masking tape instead of plastic tape.
Reducing Waste
In this area, small steps can make a big difference. Here are a few things we do to reduce waste:
- Ordering in bulk allows us to reduce the packaging waste we receive.
- We re-use shipping boxes and shipping materials, delaying their entry into the waste stream.
- Misprinted items are sold as seconds or re-used as printing rags. (This use of cotton rags helps us reduce the need for paper towels, and ensures that we are not using insidious microfiber.)
- We donate unwanted supplies to ScrapRVA, our local creative reuse center. Anything from empty containers to fabric scraps can be sold here for reuse, keeping materials out of the waste stream.