The Mythic Green

Hemp is a miracle plant, with mythic origins and a prophetic fate. 

This prestigious weed has its earliest human interrelations enshrined in ancient clay vases in China in 8000BCE, thousands of years later this crop stirred the impetus of the entire agricultural revolution. From its widespread use, cultivation, even deification, to a heavy control and authoritarian rule over the plant which lead to a

sort of global amnesia of Hemps individuated existence as a non psychoactive, incredibly versatile wonderplant. Few other weeds have had such a mystical journey in our human drama. 

Its present resurgence in the realms of ‘sustainability’ is a voice of the times, far beyond good business initiatives. For the evolution of humanity is not truly defined by the surface shifts in materiality (industrial, technological, sustainable), but the greater body of our evolutionary catalysts, the tides of consciousness that underpin each wave of change. 

It is not sustainable business that marks our times but a reawakening to intimacy, to the deep interconnected, interdependent truth of our existence on earth as one living organism. Empathetic business, buying and actions become like breathing when this awareness is embodied.

 

From the Earth

For the People

The historical repression of Hemp materialised through a plethora of misinformation, dispersed in drug related propaganda that evolved in parallel to the scientific discovery of its benefits. The plant became political where corporate interest and government interest intersect, as two hands of the one body; its versatility as an inexpensive, easily cultivated crop became a threat to the delicate game of subtle systematic control. The result was a confused pendulum of propaganda, bending to the needs of war and poverty.

From the 1936 revelation that hemp produces four times the amount of pulp than lumbering trees (which would slow the deforestation of the lungs of our earth), to the 1937 heavy taxing of all strains of cannabis including hemp, to the 1937 response to the great depression as a ‘million dollar crop’, ‘Hemp for victory’ that became signed, sealed and delivered in the ‘Controlled Substance Act’ in the same year whereby Hemp became quite consciously and concretely mislabelled as a drug. Becoming illegal, a criminal act - an evil, shameful, wrong ‘offence’ ,- the act of making clothing, building, taking medicine. 

The global storyline varies in its specifics, yet the thread remains synonymous to its story, our story of suppression by systems that don’t represent the goodwill of the people. 

Hemp Revolution

 

Today we hold space for Hemps re-emergence into the world of trade and consciousness, with the Hemp Revolution speaking not only in promise of its wild potentia to ameliorate an astoundingly vast spectrum of our man made issues but of the shifts in the very foundations of our global culture. There remains a continued confused complexity surrounding the plant with the dance of law delicately trying to classify, specify, control and profit from its use. 

Yet the Hemp Revolution is more than fibre and food, it is a legend, a myth, an important story of morality and mistreatment; a voice in union between the natural world and the people. Hemp embodied both the questions and answers, the root of our problems and the solutions. 

Who decides upon access to the organic growth of the natural world? And who gave them that power?

Who represents the voice of the plants themselves? As free and sovereign beings?

We were born into a world in chaos, a suffering planet born of an enduring chain of greed and power where nation pride is built on genecide and governance includes the mass ecological destruction of our earth. 

What does it mean to be ‘governed’ by systems rather than by leaders?

Laws are meant for the sole purpose of protecting the people and representing justice. Yet these invisible decrees (which ironically in history were signed on Hemp paper) incarcerate people for the presence of plants, or for weaving fabric, building h0mes, producing paper, relieving anxiety.

Well, we are breaking the chain. 

We speak for the Earth. 

The Message

Hemp's story is our story, the mythic journey of control of and over the natural world, as well as control of and over the people. 

Ultimately, our freedoms are interwoven.

Just because we are born into the world, woven as it is by faulty systems, it does not imply we are to accept things at state value. We have a right, all of us, as people of this earth to be here, with access to the gifts and bounty of the earth we inhabit. The deceit of our past does not govern our future and with Hemp as an ally we are set to propel the Revolution far beyond the realm of clothing but into the possibilities of freedom and justice. 

With (a known) ten millennia of our human/hemp compendium of myth and materiality, the meeting place of humanity and the natural world; what could the next ten thousand years look like if we partnered with this ally and rebuilt the earth on common values?

Hemp is an Heirloom

For a little Hempucation… 

Hemp is one of the strongest fibres in the natural world. It belongs to the label of the Cannabis Sativa family, growing like a weed - abundantly and with purpose, to heal the soil. Did you know that's what weeds do? 

Hemp grows in most types of soils and unlike other common textile plants like cotton, Hemp doesn’t deplete the soil and drain water sources but actually restores vital nutrients in the soil, purifying the air, whilst needing much less water (and that's just the growth benefits!). As it sheds its leaves, it naturally fertilises the soil as they contain organic pesticides, meaning it is pest resistant. 

Sometimes comparison helps to put things into perspective. 

Most of the clothing industry are heavy producers of cotton, these are your jeans, shirts, hats, sheets.. You name it. Most of the common clothing world is made of cheap cotton. Cheap cotton is that which is drenched in pesticides, with underpaid workers and generally industrialised on a mass scale that causes the land to go arid. 

Cotton not only depletes our limited freshwater sources, but as most farmers use toxic pesticides, the water, soil and farmers become sick with harmful chemicals. Let alone wearing it on your porous, sensitive, skin. Hemp also requires approximately half of the land and yields three times the amount of fibre than cotton.

 

So Hemp vs Cotton is an absolute no brainer.

 Other textiles have their own array of issues, such as the morality of silk (which is a byproduct of the death of millions of silk worms), or bamboo which has a heavy chemical process to soften and create the fibre we know. 

Hemp is antifungal, antibacterial and anti odorous, which means less washing and a longer life cycle. It also softens with every wash, wearing in and staying true to the nature of the plant, it keeps on giving. Keeping you protected from harmful UV rays, hemp is a perfect skin ally for summer and for sensitive skin.

 

Hemp is also completely biodegradable. Combatting a massive issue of clothing pollution that is affecting our world, not just through fast fashion but all fashion. That is why we advocate for timeless style over transient trends. It comes from the soil and returns to the soil, as is the natural cycle of the organic world. 

Hemp is the most sustainable and strongest fibre in the world. The more we invest into hemp, as producers, consumers and storytellers; the cheaper and more widespread it will become. When you buy Hemp, you are voting for the people, the planet and a vibrantly organic world.