Industrial hemp was legalized in 2018 on the premise that it would afford new opportunities for incorporating sustainability into existing manufacturing processes. Non-woven applications are simpler to achieve, and early hemp product launches have embraced non-woven methods to manufacture products like insulation and landscape matting.

Woven textiles present a constellation of challenges, starting with raw processing and then perhaps more challenging, comes spinning.  

U.S. spinners have little impetus to modify manufacturing processes to accommodate hemp fiber. Until clear indications of demand surface, progress on this front will be slow. In Europe, sustainability policy will accelerate this.

German spinner Gebruder Otto has developed a hemp cotton blend recently, comprised of 25% German-grown hemp and 75% organic cotton.

Hemp bast fibers are considerably longer than cotton, measuring between…