Last month, I recommended you all go to a private reception for artist Marian Schoettle, aka mau, who makes “post industrial folk wear” out of Tyvek.

Since then, I’ve found out mau’s all one big greenwash.

My skepticism started when I stopped by this mau event at Fred Segal Green, a self-described upscale green lifestyle store. Pre-event, I’d been led to believe that mau only used recycled Tyvek, thereby giving would-be-trash items a second life. However, at the event, the designer / artist Marian immediately told me that she uses new, pre-consumer Tyvek.

Then Marian started basically spouting the marketing speak from the manufacturer of Tyvek, the big bad Dupont. Marian insisted that because Tyvek’s a #2 plastic, it can be recycled at most places in the U.S. When I said that Tyvek actually can’t be recycled in most places — including Los Angeles — Marian acted shocked, basically saying that she was surprised that a big city such as L.A. doesn’t have a recycling program for #2 plastics in place.

The thing is, not all #2 plastics are created equal. For example, MIT’s recycling program boasts that “Any plastic item with a recycling arrow (# 1-7) on the bottom is recyclable at MIT” — but then specifies that Tyvek can’t be recycled there.

In fact, many cities that do recycle many #2 plastics can’t recycle Tyvek. Even a quick web search reveals this fact. Both Montgomery County, Maryland, and Springfield, Mass won’t take Tyvek. The Springfield website explains why (PDF): “Recycling plastics can be confusing. The chasing arrows (or triangle) with a number in the center is a code that identifies the plastic resin type. This code is used by plastics manufacturers but it DOES NOT necessarily mean the plastic is recyclable.”

Like styrofoam, Tyvek’s incredibly difficult and costly to recycle — especially as there doesn’t seem to be much of a market for Tyvek’s recycled remains. In fact, it seems the only way to recycle Tyvek is by sending it directly to the one company that insists Tyvek’s easily recyclable: Dupont, the makers of Tyvek.

No, Tyvek can’t be recycled via the city of L.A. While the city’s sanitation website says that any plastic between #1-#7 can be recycled, I didn’t have to dig too deep to find out that Tyvek wasn’t among the #2 plastics that met the recycling criteria. After some runaround from 311 and 800.773.CITY, whose phone peeps didn’t even know what Tyvek was, I got in touch with Michael Lee, a city environment engineer working on the Zero Waste LA project. He made a few calls, then got back to me — and let me know that any Tyvek put in blue bins by would-be-recycling Angelenos is duly pulled out and landfilled, due to the difficult of recycling Tyvek AND the difficulty of establishing a cost-effective program directly with Dupont.

So how exactly did mau fashions make their way into Fred Segal Green? I mean, we’re talking about a synthetic, difficult-to-recycle plastic product made by a huge chemical company best known for its many environmental offenses. mau’s only possible claim to green is the fact that its clothes can be reworn multiple times — which is also true for conventional cotton products or even toxic vinyl wear.

While I’m guessing that Marian had good intentions to start, it seems the only reason the plasticky stuff made it into Fred Segal Green is because neither the designer nor the store buyer did any substantial research — and by “any substantial research,” I mean just basic Google searches — into finding out how green a product Tyvek actually is before buying into Dupont’s greenwashing.

No, buying a mau outfit will not promote eco-fashions. It will, however, help line the pockets of Dupont while greenwashing the chemical company too. This whole Tyvek fiasco’s made me more skeptical and wary of designers who call themselves green — as well as jaded about Fred Segal Green’s buying practices — not to mention the other shops that have decided to carry mau’s so-called green products, including the MOMA store in NYC, which I used to frequent back in the day.

I guess I have a hard time understanding why a green-identified designer or store would put her name and rep behind something without doing adequate research to make sure that something actually is green. I consider myself pretty lazy, but even I raise a wary eyebrow when a chemical giant asks me to buy its story hook, line, and sinker. I’m still shocked see so many seemingly smart people simply bite Dupont’s bait, ruining both their own green creds and the goodwill of would-be green consumers.

Update, 5/7/09: My trouble with Tyvek

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