Production Process

How our products are made matters a lot to us. With all our partners, we ensure that strong environmental and ethical standards are respected. To guarantee this, we work in close collaboration with all our partners and help them to develop a sustainable production process to keep a low environmental footprint.

In Indonesia, we work with a familial workshop with who we are nearly in daily contact and collaborate to create quality products. We have supported them financially when Indonesian banks turned their back on them. To improve the working conditions, we help them to purchase tools and equipment on the international market.

The materials used to create swaps are crucial. Before each product is made, an in-depth analysis of the different options is done to find the perfect match between durability, sustainability and usability. We do prefer two main materials:

Bamboo is truly a wonder plant. It is a symbol of strength, flexibility, and sustainability. For many reasons’ bamboo, is often called ‘the world’s most renewable material’. It can grow up to one meter a day. This fast grower absorbs five times more carbon dioxide and produces 35% more oxygen than trees.

To grow like this, bamboo requires little water and neither pesticides nor fertilizers. When bamboo is harvested, the plant regenerates itself from its roots system. These root systems also prevent erosion and nourish the soil with potassium and other nutriments.

Improved techniques make it possible to create textiles from bamboo. Bamboo fibre is extremely soft, light weighted and a more sustainable alternative to cotton.

• Bamboo is not actually wood, it's a form of sweet grass!
• Bamboo is one of the fastest-growing plants on Earth.
• The record for the highest bamboo plant is held by a 48-meter-high bamboo plant in China.
• Bamboo can absorb up to 30% more CO2 than plants and trees.
• No pesticides or fertilizer are necessary to grow bamboo.
• Bamboo is good at preventing soil erosion.

Steel is the most recycled material worldwide. It can be melted to be reused and repurposed without any loss in quality. The overall recycling rate is estimated to be at an extremely high 86% ¹. This allows that a two out of three tons of the steel used today is recycled.

Modern stainless steel is safe for the workers creating it and the consumers using it.

• The earliest known use of steel was almost 4.000 years ago.
• First modern stainless steel was used in 1872.
• Firstly mass produced for railroads.