Tell us about Hemp Clothing Australia and your role?
I am the founder and director of Hemp Clothing Australia which was founded in 2017. Prior to this I ran various Australian made clothing productions here in Adelaide using Australian made fabrics. I started Hemp Clothing Australia to move in a more sustainable direction as using standard cotton and the occasional synthetic fabric was no longer, in my mind, sustainable or good for the environment. 
I wanted to radically improve the quality of the fabrics we used, so I researched a lot of natural options before starting Hemp Clothing Australia. It turned out every time, across all metrics that hemp was by far the most sustainable and renewable crop for clothing and its durability would also significantly help reduce over consumption. I saw the need to niche down into the natural fibre sector and radically change the way I approached fashion, uniform supply and custom apparel. 

Nowadays we service the fashion industry, schools, governments, other brands and plenty of businesses with custom hemp products. My wife and I now jointly manage the entire operation meaning we wear many hats of design, manufacturing, warehousing, distribution and management of our stockists, clients and online store. We are a 100% Australian owned family business and are based out of Norwood, South Australia, servicing the national and international market.

What got you interested in hemp?
The main driver was a sincere desire to change the way I and the Australian consumer think about clothing, fabrics and textiles in general. Was there a way we could counter the fast fashion approach, the seemingly unsustainable trajectory of our purchasing patterns and address the lack of knowledge in the Australian consumer in terms of what they were wearing on a daily basis. 

I understood very well that we can’t all be experts in everything so I felt it was at least appropriate after heavily researching hemp myself, to take that knowledge to the public through tangible products that could make a difference. If you wear something, chances are you’ll talk about it and start conversations with others. When you’re proud of what you’re wearing, you’re even more likely to talk about it with others and perhaps they’ll learn something new.

I was also heavily interested in the history of hemp and the absurdity of the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937. That era in history is quite dark and must have been very confusing for the majority of farmers in the USA (and abroad) who grew and even relied on hemp for their livelihoods. Why would such a highly resourceful crop be suddenly outlawed when its history of use went back literally hundreds and even thousands of years prior to the 1930’s? When I delved deeper into this topic and identified that there was a serious amount of corruption going on at that time and anti-competition behaviour from competing industries that wanted to crush the hemp industry, I realised it must have been so good that competitors couldn’t beat the hemp industry ‘on the pitch’ so they played rather dirty social and political games to have hemp outlawed. 

When I also learned the US government re-legalised hemp to support the WW2 effort, and swiftly banned it again after WW2 it really left one to wonder, why people allowed it to be outlawed a second time. Why would you put up with that if it made no sense? I was lucky enough to become interested in hemp because of the vast information available on the internet about it, which I guess earlier generations didn’t have exposure to. I also met some very interesting people in earlier years after doing a radio interview on the ABC and some people reached out to me to talk about possibilities for the future of hemp in SA and Australia in general. So we can thank the creators of the internet and those that kept hemp knowledge intact for so many years during its oppression. I think these experiences proved to me that hemp was always going to be a crop worth reviving and the public won’t tolerate it being banned again, let alone an industry that fully understands its many benefits and uses.

When did you start your hemp journey?
Around 2015 when I first started researching alternatives to non organic cotton and synthetic fabrics. By 2017 I had Hemp Clothing Australia up and running and in those first few years, I toured the country heavily with members of my family and friends, meeting others in the hemp industry. We attended and sold our goods at expo’s like the HHI Expo in NSW and VIC and The Hemp and Cannabis expo in South Australia. In addition to this I started driving around parts of NSW networking with many people who were earlier adopters of hemp and had immense knowledge of its benefits and uses. This led to meeting businesses, schools and wholesale clients who we ended up developing uniforms and fashion range items for. Today they are still clients of ours and the relationships seem to just get stronger each year which is really nice and rewarding. 

The journey doesn’t seem to end as so many people are yet to understand the benefits and uses of hemp, so it’s always a good conversation point when meeting others and the inevitable question pops up ‘what do you do?’ In these instances I do however remember to let the other person talk as it’s easy to talk for hours regarding hemp and a balanced conversation is always going to be a better one.

What’s the best thing about hemp?
For me personally it’s experiencing hemp’s superiority to synthetic materials. My entire wardrobe, our bedding and so many of the products in our home are made from hemp. You can make hemp part of your everyday life and really see the benefits, even if people can’t understand it from a distance, you can show them in a very short time when they see hemp products in person. The first time someone enters a hemp home for instance, they can see, hear and feel the difference. It is unlike any other building structure you’ve ever been in and the place almost has a resonance or aura about it that’s hard to explain. 

I think the best form of hemp has to be clothing or a hemp home or hemp building of any kind, it really doesn’t get much better than that, especially in the Australian climate where we often deal with fluctuating temperatures that swing wildly. For anyone interested in hemp I’d highly recommend looking into hemp clothing or hemp homes and see for yourself what your options are, before making your next purchases. When we consider things carefully, it can make a lifetime of difference.

What’s the worst thing about hemp?
To some degree, hemp is still being attacked or at least discouraged by certain people or entities who are ignorant, uneducated or perhaps commercially biased. I do however see the bright side that hemp is winning this information battle and instances of people having a problem with hemp are becoming fewer and far between. I would also like to see hemp become more affordable for the average person, but if you speak to any farmers of hemp, particularly in Australia, they have a lot of red-tape and restrictions on them that are holding them back. Regulation wise, hemp is still being unfairly penalised but there are people constantly working to effect change here and IHASA and the AHC are part of that movement, among others.

How do you see yourself best contributing to the hemp industry?
Continuing our combined work with IHASA is certainly up there and important to me. I look back very fondly of all member’s work and input within IHASA, helping to change the law in South Australia with the introduction of the Industrial Hemp Bill of 2016 / 2017. That was achieved by working constructively with all sides of politics, industry and Tammy Franks (MLC) who introduced this very important bill. Prior to this, an earlier generation of IHASA members had worked tirelessly for many years to achieve this goal and it is only through their persistence and the generations that came after them, that the goal was eventually achieved. 

I see IHASA as a respected signal to politics and industry that there are people out there who care and are prepared to donate their time to see the correct laws and frameworks put in place. The hemp industry still has a way to go, and further work needs to be done to assist farmers and industry to be less impacted by red tape and over-regulation, but the future’s looking bright in this regard so I feel myself and others can have some positive impact here in a number of areas going forward. 

I also feel our work with Hemp Clothing Australia is important in a number of ways. I have a particular interest in expanding our work in supplying schools and government with hemp uniforms as we’ve had some great success there. Our online store already offers a lot of everyday hemp products and our stockists carry our products in many locations around the country, so we are proud of our work there and the positive impact it has. 

In addition to retail uptake, institutional adoption of hemp products will certainly go a long way to shaping a better future. As a taxpayer, citizen and business owner, I want to continue to see the positive effects the hemp industry can have at a state, federal and international level. We are doing our part with IHASA and our company, but there is plenty more work to be done and no sign of slowing down anytime soon. Both IHASA and Hemp Clothing Australia are entities that aim to leave the world in a better place and that is a very worthwhile contribution that makes it easy to get up each morning and be motivated about the day ahead.