Edited on Sep 2nd,2022. Reading time around 4 mins.
Our second substainable brand stroy is Desserto®.
Have you ever thought about this ? A plant can turn into a REAL bag ! That’s what Desserto® did ! it transformed cactus into vegan-leather and make bags out of it ! And it’s environmentally friendly, the whole production process is recycled & clean.
What is Desserto®?
Desserto® is a highly sustainable plant-based material as an alternative to leather made from cactus, often distinguished by its great softness at touch while offering great performance for a wide variety of applications and complying with the most rigorous quality and environmental standards. The aim is to offer cruelty-free, sustainable alternatives, without any toxic chemicals, phthalates, and PVC. As a result, cactus materials could be widely used in the fashion, leather goods, luxury packaging, and furniture industries.
The founders of Desserto are two men, they are Adrián López Velarde and Marte Cázarez, they come from the fashion business. And all started this in 2019 , after working in the furniture, automotive, and fashion industries for a long time they are aware that pollution problems are a huge one in the fashion industry, actually given statistics have proved that the fashion industry is the second largest polluter in the world, and leather is a main part in the fashion industry. Much of the world’s leather comes from a cow, and that cow has to drink a lot of water up to 1,800 gallons. During the processing of the cow leather, it has to be tanned which requires even more water and it’s treated with toxic chemicals which hurt the environment and make it not biodegradable, this contributes to the 100 million tons of waste that the fashion industry creates. They decided it was time to make a change so they met and talked “We’ve got to do something to replace the leather” they started researching plant-based materials to use and after a lot of brainstorming the answer was right in front of them cactus.
Cactus is the most abundant plant in Mexico it’s everywhere and cactus is actually good for skin and does not require a lot of water and also Cactus is a natural carbon sink, it has a great CO2 absorption
capacity. From their 14 acres, they are able to absorb 8,100 tons of CO2/year while at the farm we only generate 15.30 tons of CO2 annually.
So how is the cactus leather made?
The process for cactus leather involves using either the new young leaves or the mature leaves of the plant. The the case of Desserto, they use the young leaves from the prickly pear cactus. These leaves are harvested from organically grown cactus plants, cleaned, mashed, and left in the sun to dry for three days before being processed.
The top 10 sustainable facts of Desserto® organic cactus feed-stock:
- Biodiversity amelioration in the region.
- The Catus leather is also breathable and flexible and can be used just like regular leather
- Enrichment of soil micro-flora and micro-fauna through native and typical organic cactus afforestation.
- Huge savings in water as no irrigation is applied.
- Environmental preservation as no chemicals are used like herbicides or pesticides.
- Cactus is left unharmed to enable repeated harvesting from the same plant.
- Energy savings by drying the feedstock in a solarium.
- No cross-industry conflict as the byproduct is directed to the food industry in an increased value form which is more attractive, and stimulates the agricultural sector to plant more cactus.
- Full vision and traceability of the farm to ensure sustainable social practices.
Desserto’s mission as a company is to be at the forefront of innovation going beyond the needs of the leather goods market, offering high-quality materials made with sustainable alternatives and they already gained enormous success after their first debut at the leather Fair in Milan, Italy in 2019. And they have their cover story in the most popular magazines like VOGUE, BIZZAR, THE GUARDIAN, Forbes…Next time, we can buy a handbag made by catcus materials! and Why not?
