What's in it, and what isn't.
Underwear sits against your skin for more hours a day than anything else you own. We think that's worth a page rather than a bullet point — so here's every material in a FRATE brief, what the certifications actually verify, and where the evidence is stronger or weaker than the marketing usually admits.
- Main fabric
- 95% GOTS certified organic cotton
- Stretch
- 5% BPA-free elastane
- Materials
- OEKO-TEX® STANDARD 100 certified
- Waistband
- Woven jacquard, tagless, no plastic film
- Inseam
- 5"
- Color
- Black
Your skin is not a sealed barrier.
Skin absorbs things. That isn't controversial — it's the entire basis of nicotine patches, hormone gels and every transdermal medication on the market. The open question is never whether a substance can cross skin, but how much, how fast, and what happens to it once it's through.
For one chemical relevant to clothing, that second part turns out to matter more than people assume. When a substance is swallowed, it passes through the liver before reaching general circulation, and much of it is metabolised into an inactive form on the way. Anything absorbed through skin skips that step. Research on BPA has found that dermal exposure leaves a higher proportion circulating in its active, unmetabolised form than the same amount eaten — and that it clears from the body far more slowly, remaining detectable for days rather than hours.
We want to be straight about the limits of this. That research involved handling thermal receipt paper, not wearing clothes, and other studies conclude that skin contributes only modestly to total BPA exposure compared with diet. Nobody has run the study that would settle what a pair of underwear contributes over a year of wear. Any brand telling you they know that number is guessing.
What we can say is that underwear is an unusual case. It's worn most of the day, against thin skin, under other layers, with warmth, friction and sweat — the conditions that increase absorption of most substances, not reduce them. It's the most sustained skin contact in your wardrobe by a wide margin.
We're not claiming a health outcome. We're saying that given how little is settled, the sensible response is to reduce what's there in the first place — which is what certification is for.
Global Organic Textile Standard
Most "organic cotton" claims describe how a plant was grown and stop there. A cotton fibre can be grown organically and then be scoured, bleached, dyed and finished with exactly the same chemistry as a conventional one. The fibre is organic. The garment against your skin is not.
GOTS exists to close that gap. It certifies the whole processing chain — spinning, knitting, dyeing, cutting, sewing, packaging — and every facility in that chain has to hold its own certification, with no untraced links. It restricts which chemical inputs may be used at each stage, sets requirements for wastewater treatment, and includes social criteria covering working conditions in the facilities that make the garment.
There are two label grades, and the difference is worth knowing when you're comparing brands. "Organic" requires at least 95% certified organic fibers. "Made with organic" requires at least 70%. They are not the same claim, and the second one is often written to look like the first.
- FRATE is 95% certified organic cotton, which meets the higher of the two grades.
- Every facility is independently certified, not just the farm.
- Processing chemistry is restricted at each stage, not only at the fibre.
Verify any brand's claim, including ours, at global-standard.org.
Tested for what's actually in it.
GOTS governs how a garment is made. OEKO-TEX asks a different question: what can be detected in the finished thing you'd put on. Independent laboratories test against limit values for over a thousand regulated and non-regulated substances, including azo dyes that can release aromatic amines, formaldehyde, heavy metals, chlorinated phenols, phthalates and pesticide residues.
Two details make it stricter than it first sounds. Testing covers every component, not a fabric swatch — thread, elastic, prints, labels. And the limits are tiered by how a garment is worn, with the strictest thresholds applied to items in prolonged direct contact with skin. Underwear falls in that tier. Certificates are issued per product and renewed annually rather than granted once.
Look up any certificate number at oeko-tex.com.
Why our stretch fiber is BPA-free.
Bisphenol A is an endocrine disruptor — a compound that interferes with hormone signalling by mimicking the body's own. California lists it under Proposition 65 as a reproductive toxicant, with a daily skin-exposure limit measured in millionths of a gram.
Most people associate it with plastic bottles and receipt paper rather than clothing. But independent testing by the Center for Environmental Health found BPA in polyester-based garments containing spandex — sports bras, athletic shirts, socks — at levels many times California's dermal limit, apparently added to improve colorfastness and reduce static. The same testing did not find it in natural fibers.
Our fabric is 95% cotton, which puts the bulk of the garment outside the category where BPA has been found. For the 5% that provides stretch, we specify BPA-free elastane. It's a small share of the material and the easiest thing in the world to leave unexamined — which is exactly why we'd rather name it.
We haven't removed BPA from a product that would otherwise harm you. We've removed a variable nobody has fully characterised from a garment you'll wear against your skin every day.
What we left out.
- Polyester and nylon. Petroleum-derived synthetics, and the fabrics microfiber shedding research concentrates on.
- Uncertified components. Every part of the garment is covered by our STANDARD 100 certificate.
- BPA in the stretch fiber. See above.
- Plastic waistband film. The band is woven, not laminated.
- Printed tags. Tagless, so there's no coated label sitting against your back.
Check it yourself.
Both of our certifications carry a number that is unique to FRATE. They're printed on the tag wrapped around every pair, and you can look either one up without asking us for anything.
Grade: Organic
Standard 100
And the primary sources, rather than our summary of them:
- Global Organic Textile Standard — the full standard, label grades and certified facility database.
- OEKO-TEX® — what STANDARD 100 tests for, product classes, and certificate lookup.
- Hormann et al., PLOS ONE (2014) — dermal absorption of BPA and bioactive serum levels.
- Center for Environmental Health — independent testing that found BPA in polyester-spandex garments.
Now go put them on.
95% GOTS certified organic cotton, 5% BPA-free elastane, and a Natural Fit 3D Pouch. From $21.33 a pair.
See the brief