An intercultural family venture – est. 1999
Cutting-edge finishes on ancient biomaterials.
The Ugandan-German family venture BARK CLOTH is pioneer of systematic bark cloth development and production, dedicated to the continuing cooperation with small-scale organic farmers from Uganda – since 9.9.1999.
The Barongo-Heintz family plucked up courage and went on their way to giving more functionality to the Cloth from Trees through state-of-the-art, but socio-economically and infrastructurally adjuisted processes: Bark Cloth goes BARKTEX®. New, worldwide unique textiles and fiber composites are constantly developed and produced in our manufactories in Uganda and Germany – usually in low energy, partly CO2-emission-free processes. In uniting Africa's sumptuous skills, ornamental arts and improvisational ability with innovative finishes, European functionality and a pinch of Zen, it becomes a global material.
Hand in hand with well known universities and research institutions, such as Design Academy Eindhoven, London Metropolitan University, Parsons New York, NASA, ESDI Rio de Janeiro, Fraunhofer, Steinbeis or the German Aerospace Center, the intercultural and interdisciplinary material engineering opens to date unexpected ways in for designers, developers, architects, artists and visionaries and make BARK CLOTH the innovation and market leader for biomaterials based on tree bark.
The former development partnership with the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development and its implementation organization GIZ provides now hundreds of craftswomen and farmer families with a secure income by far above usual local standards.
Meanwhile, BARK CLOTH is also cooperating with farmers and artisan groups in Brazil, PNG and Honduras, sourcing renewable semi-finished fiber goods for architectural uses and design products. In the global village, the small BARK CLOTH group practices continuously successfully value-adding against the tide. We invest explicitly, where commonly investments are considered as risky, but manageable for us due to strong (familiar) ties in the production areas.
