Matt & Nat

The CEO of Matt & Nat visits the factories where the handbags are made 3 times a year. Twice a year audits are performed to guarantee that no child labour is used and that wages are fair. The factories work under the SA800 standard which guarantees good working conditions. At COSH! We are still not entirely clear on where exactly these factories are located, so we will ask further.

The Canadian brand experiments with different kinds of materials, including nylon, cardboard, rubber and cork. The vegan handbags are mainly made of polyurethane (PU), a type of plastic. Although the brand claims on its website that it is biodegradable, it is absolutely not. Plastic will leave microplastics in the environment once it is discarded. What has to be said is that PU is more environmentally friendly than the formerly widely used polyvinyl chloride (PVC). But PU is far from environmentally friendly, for the production of this vegan leather many harmful chemicals and large amounts of water are still needed.

At COSH, we are less of a fan of artificial materials, as their production requires fossil fuels, which send greenhouse gases into the air. But if a brand chooses to use artificial materials, we recommend recycled materials. Good news! The lining of the handbags, briefcases, wallets and toilet bags at Matt & Nat is made of 100% recycled nylon. Every year the brand calculates that they recover 9 million plastic bottles from the waste mountain.

The brand also experiments with leather from fruit peels. COSH investigated that with many vegan leather made from fruit, a large part of plastic was added, which made recycling difficult. All in all, we are not so much a fan of the vegan leather in Matt & Nat’s handbags, but we do like the lining of recycled plastic.

Most of this brand’s products are made of a material blend, where different materials are combined in one product. For example the vegan leather alternatives where plantbased materials are added to a base of plastics. 

Some designs are made out of recycled materials, which helps the circularity of the brand, but this does not suffice.

The brand office is located in Montreal, but does not provide any further information about the location of the supply chain. One of the production locations may be in Italy, which already increases the length of the chain across continents. They also do not inform us of their transportation methods.

Although the brand does not use animal ingredients such as animal skins, the handbags are not entirely animal friendly. Once the plastic ends up in the trash, it ends up in the food of the animals. Although vegan leather is supposed to be ​‘animal friendly’, it can also be harmful to life on land and in the water. 

The items are timeless pieces that can be used past short-living trends. Sadly, there is still some debate about the quality of vegan leather alternatives. The innovative materials are often not durable, as they may wear out faster and are more difficult to repair. The wear of the material also risks the release of microplastics.

The brand has a transparency section dedicated to their production facilities, detailing the importance of ethical workplace practices, and mentioning that one of their factories operates by the SA8000 standard, however they do not provide any information past this. They sometimes mention ​“made in Italy” under a product description, but this does not say much. They have a long way to go to improve on transparency still.