California-based cotton breeder Sally Fox did not invent naturally coloured cotton. But she was able to improve on its previously weak fiber quality by cross-breeding it with other varieties. This made it compatible with new, high-speed, machines to be milled into a variety of fabrics. Her registered trademark company Foxfiber produces the world’s first naturally-coloured millable cotton. The Colorganic cotton from Fox’s farms does away with the water wastage usually associated with traditional dyeing.  

Fox, a graduate in entomology, started this as a hobby in San Diego in 1982. The very first green cotton plant that she found and grew looked very much like a hollyhock plant. “It grew taller than five feet and then right when it was time to harvest it, the mainstream would bend and break, and all the cotton inside the bolls would fall out. The green colour would fade to a tan in the sun,” Fox tells mid-day in an email interview.