Amazing miracle

granted by the Arctic to mankind

The down and its value

Arctic bird down combines two unique properties - the highest level of thermal insulation and incredible lightness. Such characteristics allow to consider this material as the best natural filler for blankets and outerwear.

common eider

Somateria mollissima mollissima is a subspecies of common eider inhabiting the shores and islands of the White, Barents, Northern and Baltic Seas. In contrast to its western congener, it nests away from humans, which makes its down the rarest of all mined eiders. It is also the most insulated, as the bird lives in very harsh conditions. Until recently, there was no legal and environmentally friendly collection of this type of down.

BARNACLE GOOSE

Branta leucopsis (Barnacle Goose) lives and nests on the shores of the Arctic Ocean seas. The down of this bird is not much different from that of eiderdown, but its collection and processing is more labor-intensive. The only place in the world where goose down collection is permitted is Kolguev Island in the Barents Sea.

Arctic bird habitats

Every year our team collects arctic bird fluff on the islands of the White and Barents Seas. These ecologically clean places, remote from civilization, are the natural habitat of eiders and gooses.

All down collecting expeditions are accompanied by ornithologists and only during the last stages of birds' nesting.

The root cause of all magical properties

The structure of the down of Arctic birds is so refined that it can only be viewed with an electron microscope. Each fluff consists of many thin and elastic threads, diverging in all directions from the center of the fluff. Wrapping around each other threads fluff form an elastic three-dimensional network, like cotton candy. Note that the photo shows a fluff that has been magnified 800 times.