Disclaimer: First and foremost, there are so many different types of leather used in the fashion industry that it would need an academic paper to contrast all. With this blog post, we want you to become acquainted with the leather we use for our goods neglecting any comparisons.
Dear friends!
While establishing band&roll as a label of our life, it was a no-brainer for us to address small family-run tanneries within the genuine Italian Vegetable Tanned Leather Consortium in Tuscany, Italy. It is the only existing Consortium of leather artisans operating in the world and standing for the highest leather quality available to the humankind.
A vegetable tanned leather has unique features: it absorbs the traces of human life and matures without ruining. The natural aging does not compromise its resistance. It reveals the signs of time and use as the most personal expression of naturalness and truth. In other words, it is a natural canvas to record your life experiences.
But what does vegetable tanning mean?! It is a process which is renowned as the most traditional, natural, and durable method of transforming animal skin into leather. The transformation slowly happens in wooden drums, in full respect of man and the environment. A process based on the use of natural tannins extracted from trees, vegetables, and even fruits.
To ensure its original quality, the Consortium acts as guarantor and ambassador of the Tuscan excellence all over the world, which is represented by the trademark “Pelle Conciata al Vegetale in Toscana”. Hence, all of our leather goods come with these trademark seals to warrant they are genuine.
Environmental impact of vegetable tanned leather as officially stated by the Consortium:
- Is strictly monitored to ensure a low impact on the environment.
- Does not contain any toxic substance such as azo-dyes, nickel, PCP or chrome VI
- No animal is killed for its skin. On the contrary, the raw hides used by Consortium tanneries are the discarded by-products of the food industry producing meat for human consumption.*
- Natural tannins, used in a vegetable tanning process, can be easily disposed of, thanks to their chemical-biological characteristics.
- The tanneries make huge investments in depuration systems and waste recycling that make them work in full respect of man and the environment.
- Many of the substances used during the tanning process are recovered, recycled and reused in different fields. Hair removed from raw hides is transformed into agricultural fertilizer; sludge produced by the depuration plants is reused in the construction field to make bricks.
* The leather we use comes from free-range cows living a happy life in France.
For more information visit The Genuine Italian Vegetable Tanned Leather Consortium.