Using cold water to wash your garments is better for the environment and the garments. Cold water washing helps to reduce color-fading while also using less energy.

Try to hang dry when possible. Avoiding the dryer saves electricity and prevents fiber degradation, maintaining the integrity of your garments.

If you choose to dry clean, select an eco-friendly dry cleaner that avoids harmful chemicals and reduces packaging waste, such as plastic covers.

To get out minor wrinkles, hang your garment in the bathroom while you shower. The steam created is usually enough to smooth out most fabrics.

A skilled local tailor can helpextend the life of your garments by making small design updates and/or sizing tweaks if needed.

You can always refresh an older piece with minor updates to make it look new. Try altering a hem, changing out the buttons, or dyeing to achieve a new color.

Minor damages are easily repaired at home—whether you need to fix a broken strap or replace a lost button. Yarn pulls can be repaired by carefully pulling the loose thread to the next stitch with a dull needle and a gentle fabric stretch. More complex repairs should be taken to tailor. Send a photo to connect@gstq.com, and our team will be happy to provide suggestions.

GSTQ clothing is designed with longevity in mind. To help increase it even further, use a site like Poshmark or ThredUp to resell your clothes online.

Organize a clothing swap with your community to trade clothing and help keep garments out of the landfill.

Garment donations and recycling are a big challenge for the apparel industry. Donation centers are inundated with used garments—so much so that only about 10-20% of the items make it into the hands of a new owner (Council for Textile Recycling, 2018). Donation centers typically hand off 80-90% of donated items to textile recyclers that down-cycle them by turning them into insulation or rags. Alternatively, the donated items are diverted from the recycler to other countries that often don’t need them, so the items are sent directly to landfills overseas.

Deadstock is leftover fabric that results from mills and brands ordering more material than they ultimately need. We use some deadstock in our collections in order to help repurpose excess fabric and divert it from landfill. However, we recognize its potential challenges, including limited supply chain traceability.

Elastane is a widely used synthetic material that lends stretch and provides comfort to a fabric while retaining its structure. Alternate solutions have been rolling out over the past few years, and we are exploring commercially available solutions.

LENZING™ ECOVERO™ is an airy, lightweight, and breathable material derived from responsibly forested trees. Soft and luxurious, we love LENZING™ ECOVERO™ for its anti-wrinkle properties—ensuring you and your GSTQ garments are polished to perform.

Lyocell is a wrinkle-resistant and moisture-wicking fabric made from renewable cellulose fibers derived from wood or bamboo. Super soft and silky, lyocell also retains its strength and elasticity—resulting in a durable, breathable, and feel-good fiber.

Natural and renewable, organic cotton certification prohibits the use of toxic chemicals or genetically modified seeds. Organic cotton’s cultivation has a lower impact on the environment compared to conventional cotton, which is grown with chemicals that are classified as highly toxic by the EPA. We love the combination of organic cotton’s soft touch and lower impact.

Polyamide is a durable, elastic, and lightweight synthetic fabric derived from petroleum. You likely know it as nylon. Virgin polyamide is an increasingly diminishing piece of our fabric library, and we are working hard to phase it out. Our goal is to achieve 100% recycled fabric content for all synthetic textiles that remain part of our collections.

Polyester is a durable synthetic textile derived from petroleum. Virgin polyester is an increasingly diminishing piece of our fabric library, and we are working hard to phase it out. Our goal is to achieve 100% recycled fabric content for all synthetic textiles.

Recycled Cotton is made from material by-products and repurposed textiles that are spun into new yarns and fabrics—saving fabric waste from ending up in the landfill. Our garments that utilize recycled cotton are typically blended with another fiber to maintain the beautiful hand feel you expect from your GSTQ pieces.

Repreve® Recycled Polyester is a polyester performance fiber known for its moisture-wicking, plus adaptive warming and cooling properties. Made from 100% recycled plastic primarily from post-consumer plastic bottles, Repreve® offsets the use of virgin petroleum. Its production emits fewer greenhouse gases and conserves both water and energy in the process.

TENCEL™ Lyocell fibers are extracted from sustainably grown wood using a closed loop system that recycles solvents and therefore minimizes the environmental impact of production.

TENCEL™ Lyocell is a wrinkle-resistant, moisture-wicking, silky, and super soft fabric that also retains its strength and elasticity—resulting in a durable, breathable, and feel-good fiber.

Forest-based textiles such as rayon, viscose, modal, and lyocell are being used more frequently in the fashion industry due to the demand for renewable and sustainable raw textiles. However, these materials can be sourced from areas where deforestation or poor forestry practices are common—creating a growing threat to the world’s forests. To ensure we are a part of the solution, all of our applicable garments carry a Forest Stewardship Council certification. This means the materials are verified to have originated from sustainably farmed and legal forests.

GOTS certified products provide our customers the power to choose truly organic products from the harvesting of raw materials through environmentally and socially responsible supply chains and manufacturing. This certification also requires strict social and environmental criteria for operations along the entire textile supply chain. We selected GOTS certification for our products because it is recognized as the world’s leading standard.

The Global Recycled Standard is a product standard that tracks and verifies the content of recycled materials in a final garment. This standard supports our desire to verify not only the recycled content of our products, but also responsible social, environmental, and chemical practices in our garments’ production.

An international, voluntary standard, the Organic Content Standard is a tool to verify the presence and amount of organic material in a final product, while also tracking the flow of material from its source to the final product. You can trust that any garment with the OCS certification contains between 95 and 100 percent organic material.