TAICHUNG CITY, Taiwan — The HWC Mask, the revolutionary new eco-friendly face mask composed of natural coffee fibers, is live on global crowdfunding platform Kickstarter and raising funds to bring the project to life. HWC Roasters, a renowned Taiwan-based coffee brand, focuses every day on providing some of the world’s best specialty coffee. The process inevitably leads to excess coffee materials which for most companies, just ends up being tossed aside.
HWC has taken an innovative approach to reusing this material—creating a completely biodegradable mask that aims to help the world through the pandemic.
“Every day we try to reflect our values in our spending, trying to reduce waste and supporting environmentally sustainable products. But when Covid became our reality, it was easy to put our values aside,” says founder Hsin-Yu Huang on the inspiration behind the project. “In the early days of the pandemic, the rush to be prepared made remembering and prioritizing eco-friendly decisions challenging.”
The HWC Mask is a combination of Lyocell fibre and S. Café® Coffee fibre. It presents three main features. First, being natural and environmentally friendly, it is made by sustainable regeneration natural wood pulp and environmentally friendly coffee yarn, from natural and recycled waste materials. It is a strong and excellent environmentally friendly “green” fiber. Second, it can absorb odors due to coffee yarn technology! Compared with ordinary fibers, it can provide better odor absorption, a natural result of the use of coffee fibers. And lastly, this mask worn as a primary mask or mask protector is soft and comfortable. It’s high-grade clothing material which will provide lasting colors though many washes.
“We are living under a pandemic, having a mask on us is now an everyday task. Masks are a necessity. However, because we are so in need of the mask, there is just isn’t enough of it, either we end up wearing fabric masks that can’t prevent COVID or we just made a lot of trash around us. A lot of people doesn’t care where they throw their mask. And the mask ends up in the rive, aside from the road, nature, or just on the ground,” adds Huang. “Facing the hard truth that Covid will continue to be part of our shared experience through 2021, I invite you to look for an alternative face covering that won’t compromise your environmental values.”
Sustainability with style— The HWC Face Mask is currently live and available to support on Kickstarter: www.kickstarter.com/projects/yh184184/hwc-face-mask
About HWC
HWC is a coffee brand that focused on specialty coffee from Taiwan. Since we had so many coffee grinds, we start to think about how we can reuse them. We accidentally came cross this special membrane that is thin, light, and can block particles size up to 75 nanometers. And then there comes the pandemic, with these two advantages we provide a washable and deodorant safe mask.
For more information on HWC, please visit hwcroasters.com
