Dezember 03, 2020

YOGA MAT SUSTAINABLE AND RECYCLED

The material of your mat one of the most essential choice you'll have to make. Why?

Because the material will determine the lifespan of your yoga mat, whether it can be recycled, how eco-friendly your yoga mat is, how grippy the surface is and how easy it is to clean it.

Premium, sustainable and recycled:

- top layer: CORK + TPE

CORK: sustainable produced in Portugal harvested in a traditional environmentally friendly technique with a smoth and excellent grippy texture to support your balance even during sweaty practice, allowing you to flow between postures without sticking to the mat. Cork is antimicrobial, eliminating naturally bacteria, germs, and smells.

*https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26635416

The cork using in our mats has the - Forest Management Certification- which confirms that the forest is being managed in a way that preserves biological diversity and benefits the lives of local people and workers, while ensuring it sustains economic viability. The cork for these particular mats is grown in the Mediterranean, these forests support one of the world’s highest levels of biodiversity and not a single tree is cut down to harvest cork, rather, the bark is stripped by hand every 9 years and the trees can live up to 300 years. Harvesting cork is performed completely by hand and provides over 100,000 fair wage jobs. Cork oak trees store carbon in order to regenerate their bark and harvested cork oak trees absorbs up to five times more, carbon dioxide.

*https://fsc.org/en/forest-management-certification

What is TPE? TPE (Thermoplastic Elastomer) is a non-toxic, biodegradable, plasticizer-free material designed to decompose. It’s generally hard to control what exact substances get into the TPE. Still, the material is eco-friendly and safer than PVC, like most conventional yoga mats are made from, being free from plasticizers (such as lead, cadmium, dioxin or phthalates) used to make the mats more sticky and pliable thereby increasing their toxicity. It has been proved in several studies that the exposure to this substances have a negative health effect.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30415604/

https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1944/13/3/782

- base layer: 50% natural rubber + 50% recycled rubber

The underside of the mat is also non-slip due to a ribbed rubber structure, holding and giving you versatility even on slippery surfaces.

50% is made from natural rubber

Coming from plantations in Asia and South America, the caoutchouc is extracted from the milk of the caoutchouc tree in a sustainable practice. It has been found that the Para rubber tree is an ecologically sustainable crop and actually contributes to the maintenance of the global carbon balance in the atmosphere. Rubber mats are made without any phthalates, plasticizers or additives, making them biodegradable. Normally most rubbers would go to landfill, creating waste and pollution, but natural rubber can be recycled into another product, like tyres. What is even better is when recycled rubber products come to the end of their life, they can be recycled again into another product. Our mats are manufactured on the island of Taiwan by companies with years of experience that are regularly tested on health-hazarding substances by the SGS-Institute.

https://www.institut-fresenius.de/de/

50% recycled rubber (including old yoga mats)

We also reduce our footprint by using recycled rubber production residue on the undersides of our mats. In terms of performance, rubber offers grip, durability and cushioning. The base layer of the yoga mats are 99% latex free, and safe for most people with a latex hypersensitivity. However in case of a very severe allergy we recommend avoiding the exposure the mat.

- paper packaging:

All of our products are shipped using only 100% recycled or recyclable cardboard and kraft paper.

- Our orders are shipped, CO2-neutrally, with DHL GoGreen.