Earlier this year, I bought a Guppyfriend Washing Bag and added it to my laundry routine. STOP! Micro Waste, a nonprofit initiative started by two friends who surf and who co-own German outdoor apparel company Langbrett, developed the Guppyfriend as a way to trap microfibers during laundry. Microfibers — teeny tiny plastic fibers barely visible to our eyes — are generated whenever we wash our clothes. Too small to be caught by current waste water management systems, they end up in our rivers and oceans, in animals, and in our food supply.
When I first learned about the big problem with tiny microfibers, I vowed to stop buying synthetic clothing. But it’s hard to avoid synthetics in some items like bras or athletic and outdoor wear. Plus, I wasn’t about to throw out perfectly wearable clothes just because they’re synthetic. Hence, the need for a Guppyfriend.
I know that a minority of people washing our clothes in a special bag isn’t going to solve our plastic pollution problem. We really need to think about it on the macro level and implement systemic change — something that STOP! Micro Waste acknowledges. But I figured that I can do my small part. I don’t know how much using a Guppyfriend helps, but it certainly can’t hurt.
How to use the Guppyfriend Washing Bag
The Guppyfriend is basically a very fine mesh bag. It’s made out of untreated, undyed polyamide. (Yes, this is a plastic bag for catching plastic.) This begs the question: Does the Guppyfriend itself release microfibers since it’s plastic? No. The website states, “The mesh is made out of monofilaments, which are more like sticks than threads, and thus does not release fibers itself.” With the exception of the zipper, the whole bag consists of this material. When the bag reaches the end of its lifecycle, you can send it back to STOP! Micro Waste for recycling.
Right now, the Guppyfriend comes in one size: 19.7″ × 29.1″ (50 × 74 cm). STOP! Micro Waste says they plan to make other sizes, but that this medium size is the most efficient for reducing fiber shedding. According to their website, “If you put all your clothes into one large Guppyfriend Washing Bag, they would lose more microfibers by rubbing against each other than if you used two medium sized Guppyfriends.”
As you can see, it’s a pretty decent size, though you should not fill it more than two-thirds of the way. Clothes in the bag need some room to move around to get clean, so don’t overfill it. After loading the bag, zip it shut, making sure to secure the zipper pull in the fabric band.
A band keeps the zipper pull shut in place during washing.
The instructions say to launder in water no hotter than 40 C/ 104 F. I’ve never really thought about how hot the hot setting on a washing machine is. I googled it and it’s about 130 degrees. The warm setting is 90 to 110 degrees. In other words, wash in cold or lukewarm water.
** affiliate links below **
STOP! Micro Waste also recommends using liquid detergents, though they specify that you shouldn’t use detergent that contains liquid plastics or abrasives. When I read that, I thought, “WTF are liquid plastics? There’s plastic in liquid form in normal laundry detergent?!” They’re referring to “abrasives, binding and film-forming agents, rubber and silicones, opacifiers, acrylates, and cross-polymers.” (I use naturally-derived, biodegradable brands like Seventh Generation or Method.)
I put the Guppyfriend in one side of the washer and balanced the load with some cotton towels.
After washing the clothes and removing them from the bag, this is what I found inside the bag: little gray smudges. I rubbed the gray smudges, gathering them up with my fingers and disposed of them in the trash. Do not rinse the bag, as that would defeat the whole purpose of using the Guppyfriend!
Honestly, though, sometimes I’m too lazy to collect the little fibers as it does take some time, so I just leave them in there and use the bag again. (STOP! Micro Waste says this is A-OK. Whew!) The fibers tend to migrate to the corners of the bag or the seams, so I wait until there’s a critical mass in those spots, which makes them easier to remove.
Does the Guppyfriend Work?
STOP! Micro Waste says three institutions tested the bag. “The determined fiber retention capacity in all tests was above 90% — mostly close to 100%.” However, “nanoparticles, like production residues, often found on cheaper textiles can not be hold (sic) back by the Guppyfriend Washing Bag.” It also notes that bag significantly reduces the amount of fibers breaking in the first place, which extends the life of garments.
Also, by the looks of these gray smudges, I’d say yes. Sometimes I don’t see that much gray stuff, but that doesn’t mean the bag isn’t working. Microfibers are, well, micro, so you may not see them until they accumulate. Also, these fibers are probably gray because I washed dark-colored clothes, which feature abundantly in my wardrobe. Fibers from lighter-colored clothes are not as easy to spot on a white bag. (Yes, this means that I broke one of the cardinal rules of laundry and washed a bag of dark clothes with white towels in the photo above! Doh!)
As to my clothes, I felt like there was no negative impact on their cleanliness. They were just as clean as if I had washed them without the bag.
One thing that I was a little confused about was which fabrics I should put in the Guppyfriend. Obviously: polyester, nylon, and acrylic. But how about synthetic fabrics that come from cellulose like rayon or modal? And what about clothes that contain a bit of spandex like my jeans? With a garment that’s 97% cotton, is it safe to assume that the likelihood of it generating microfibers is low?
Using the Guppyfriend has made me take a closer look at the fiber content of my clothes. I found that my Muji socks, which I thought of as cotton, contain some nylon or polyester. Some of my shirts and sweatshirts, I realized, are actually cotton-polyester blends. This interesting article about textiles calls cotton-poly blends “the Styrofoam of the clothing world — since the fibers cannot be separated from each other,” rendering them not recyclable. While it seems some strides are being made in figuring out how to separate the fibers, it’s easier to recycle a fabric that’s made out of one material.
Overall, I find the Guppyfriend easy to incorporate into my laundry routine and I’ll continue to use it. I might even get another one. There’s another microfiber-catching device out there: the Cora Ball, but it catches fewer fibers (26% of microfibers).
The Guppyfriend site has a pretty lengthy FAQ if you want to learn more about it. One thing’s that’s missing from it, though, is manufacturing information. Where exactly do they make it? (The box says it’s made in China.) What are the factory conditions?
The Guppyfriend retails for $29.75 and can be found at REI or Patagonia, which helped fund its development and was the first retailer in the United States to carry it. I ordered mine from Reformation because there was no minimum required for free shipping.
