soil_expert

soil_expert Urban soil research and education

Designers have to plan for end of life from the start, brands have to share farmers’ risk through fair contracts and col...
10/03/2026

Designers have to plan for end of life from the start, brands have to share farmers’ risk through fair contracts and collective action, and the industry has to rebuild local, place-based relationships from soil to garment.

These are my takeaways from Eileen Fisher Foundation Regenerative by Design report and the From Soil to Social Systems conversation. Swipe through, then save it for your next brief.

Thank you Eileen Fisher, Hannah Scharmer, Antoinette Klatzky, Amy Hall and Rebecca Burgess (Fibershed).

Where do your clothes begin, and where do they end up?Both answers are soil. My new commentary in Chem Circularity Cell ...
09/28/2026

Where do your clothes begin, and where do they end up?

Both answers are soil. My new commentary in Chem Circularity Cell Press makes the case: no sustainable fashion system can exist without healthy soil.

Soil shapes fiber quality, and it also moves contaminants into the fiber. Cadmium accumulates in bast fibers in proportion to soil levels. PFAS build up in h**p. So far, no study has followed those compounds through spinning into a finished garment.

Cotton grows on about 2.4% of the world’s cropland and accounts for 11% of global pesticide use. At the other end, dyes, finishes and fiber fragments return to soil through landfill leachate and sewage sludge.

I propose a four-node framework that tracks this chemistry from farm soil to fiber, through manufacturing, and back into soil.

Brands, designers, certifiers: which of these nodes can you see in your own supply chain?

Full commentary at the link in bio.

When did you last ask what was in the soil your clothes came from?At the Regenerative Textile Forum Why Regenerative dur...
09/26/2026

When did you last ask what was in the soil your clothes came from?

At the Regenerative Textile Forum Why Regenerative during Climate Week NYC, I gave a talk called “Soil: Fashion’s Missing Metric.”

Fashion measures emissions, water use, and end-of-life recovery. Soil rarely makes the list, even though it is where fashion starts and ends.

A few years ago I tested my old red jacket with the same portable XRF I use on soil. It read 19 ppm cadmium. What does that mean for the person wearing it?

We have health-based guidelines for cadmium in soil and water, and none for the clothes on our skin.

So I proposed a soil-grounded chemical traceability framework with four nodes: farm soil, fiber and yarn, manufacturing, and end of life. It would track what enters, what carries through, and what returns to the ground.

If this raises questions about your own supply chain, message me. Where do you think the loop closes?

Regenerative textiles fail or succeed on who carries the cost and risk of transition, and right now that is the farmer W...
09/25/2026

Regenerative textiles fail or succeed on who carries the cost and risk of transition, and right now that is the farmer Why Regenerative



At Why Regenerative NYC, Seed2Shirt founder put regenerative implementation at roughly $40 to $50 an acre, on a 12 month crop cycle against a 24 month collection plan.

Black farmers have historically been left out of the programs that cover that cost. Her ask for brands: invest before harvest, and share data across every tier, from the farm up to your materials team.

If cotton stops paying, growers plant something else. The panel’s two proposals for brands were to fund farmer premiums from a separate budget so they survive cost cuts, and to swap one national definition of regenerative for regional playbooks. As one panelist put it, what works in Texas won’t work in Georgia.

One founder’s case at Why Regenerative: health sells natural fibers faster than climate does. More than half of global fiber production is polyester.

That line from Eileen Fisher explains why transition risk lands on growers. Patagonia’s partner in India buys cotton during transition and covers certification costs, and Patagonia reported 43% higher net income per hectare for ROC farmers in the program. The simplest intervention offered from the stage: get your teams onto farms.

I also took the stage. What I told fashion’s regenerative leaders drops next.

I‘ll be speaking at the Regenerative Textiles Forum, part of NYC Climate Week Why Regenerative Thursday, Sept. 24, 2026 ...
09/21/2026

I‘ll be speaking at the Regenerative Textiles Forum, part of NYC Climate Week Why Regenerative

Thursday, Sept. 24, 2026 | 12:00–4:00 PM | 873 Broadway, New York

I’ll be talking about something most sustainability frameworks skip: soil. Fiber quality starts in the soil it’s grown in, and what happens to that soil after the garment is discarded matters just as much.

Overfertilization and pesticide overuse produce weaker fiber, often unfit for recycling. On the other end, textile chemicals like azo dyes and PFAS return to soil through wastewater and biosolids, where some persist and affect plant growth and microbial life.

We regulate heavy metals in soil and water. We don’t yet have equivalent standards for what’s in our clothes.

The forum brings together brands, cotton and materials groups, investors, and researchers working on regenerative supply chains.

What if a book could grow into a garden? 🌱In Moscow, I visited Together We Are Power! Eco-Communities Today, an exhibiti...
09/20/2026

What if a book could grow into a garden? 🌱

In Moscow, I visited Together We Are Power! Eco-Communities Today, an exhibition exploring what artists, designers, and communities can create from materials we normally discard Канал куратора Алексея Шульгина .

Bottle caps became images. Packaging became clothing. Waste became sculpture, design, and a reason for people to work together.

The project that stayed with me most was Anastasia Grushenkova’s Ecology of Connections.

She created an art-zine from recycled cellulose and medicinal-plant seeds. After the publication has served its purpose, it can decompose and support the growth of a small medicinal garden.

The project connects 16 members of the Sobirka EcoCenter through their stories, values, and chosen plants. Together, they form a network inspired by mycelium.

This is the material journey we explore at House of Soil:

Soil → material → meaning → soil.

What would you create if its next life had to be considered from the beginning?

09/18/2026

We planted a friendship that can talk 🍎🌳

During the Smart and Sustainable Cities Conference at РУДН in Moscow, participants from different countries stepped outside the lecture halls and planted a new Friendship Garden together.

One of the apple trees was connected to a TreeTalker, a sensor developed by Professor Riccardo Valentini and his research team. Professor Valentini has worked with RUDN for many years, connecting forest ecology, climate science, and urban sustainability.

Depending on its configuration, TreeTalker can follow changes in tree growth, water movement, stability, light, and local climate.

I love what this garden brings together: soil, technology, science, and human connection.

Years from now, its trees may hold a record of changing environmental conditions and the international community that planted them.

Would cities protect trees differently if every tree could tell us when it was struggling?

Would you still call it waste if you wanted to carry it?I met the founder of Daffodil Studio, a Jaipur-based studio work...
08/29/2026

Would you still call it waste if you wanted to carry it?

I met the founder of Daffodil Studio, a Jaipur-based studio working with reclaimed cotton textile waste, block printing, Kantha stitching, and artisan-made textiles.

What caught my attention was the combination of circularity and craft. The notebooks are made from diverted textile waste, while the bags, jackets, and other pieces carry the visible hand of the makers behind them.

I am always interested in brands that make sustainability feel beautiful, tactile, and useful, rather than purely technical.

This could be an interesting sourcing lead for boutiques, conferences, gifting, design collaborations, or anyone looking for pieces with a stronger story behind the material.

Would you rather receive one of these as a conference gift than another branded water bottle?

Tag someone who chooses gifts, products, or collaborations for a brand or organization, and save this for future sourcing.

Daffodil Studio

What if we could grow what we wear?This mycelium leather hat is part of the work of Dr. D. Marshall Porterfield, Profess...
08/28/2026

What if we could grow what we wear?

This mycelium leather hat is part of the work of Dr. D. Marshall Porterfield, Professor of Agricultural and Biological Engineering at Purdue University and CTO of MyCo, the company commercializing the Mycoponics™ technology he developed at Purdue Agriculture.

Mycoponics uses controlled cultivation of fungal mycelium to create materials and other products with applications ranging from fashion and biodegradable consumer goods to food, pharmaceuticals, and even future space systems.

MyCo specifically describes custom mycelium leather products, including gloves, as one potential application.

For me, this hat is a small but tangible example of where biology, material science, design, and fashion can meet.

It also opens a bigger conversation about how we might grow materials differently, reduce waste, and rethink the relationship between what we wear and the biological systems that produce it.

My parents grow most of what they eat. My niece thinks this is normal.Most kids have never seen a watermelon before it r...
08/18/2026

My parents grow most of what they eat. My niece thinks this is normal.

Most kids have never seen a watermelon before it reaches the plate. Everything here came out of the same soil my family has worked for three generations.

➡️ Send this to someone who grew up in a garden.

❓What’s one food you’ve eaten straight out of the ground?


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