There are a number of reasons people are trying to move away from traditional leather these days, whether it’s for environmental purposes or in the pursuit of better treatment of animals. And while vegan leather has been around for a while now, it’s often just PVC, a plastic material that, while being vegan, isn’t necessarily sustainable. People are becoming increasingly aware of the environmental impact of fashion and trying to find alternatives, and that’s where fungi can come in.
The environmental impact of leather is well-documented. Even after the fact that cattle-ranching is responsible for 80% of Amazon deforestation, the hides need to go through an intensive process in order to be turned into leather, including a high amount of polluting heavy metals such as Chromium. PVC leather isn’t much better, using non-renewable fossil fuels and having a long degradation time, adding to landfill waste around the world.
Whereas mycelium has been used in the fashion industry for some time now, with manufacturers like Bolt Threads supplying big name fashion brands such as Adidas, Lululemon, and Stella McCartney, scientists are continuing to try and streamline the process.
A team from the University of Denver have investigated a new method using a paste substrate on which to grow the mycelium. This substrate has been carefully created in order to provide the perfect amount of nutrients, with the hope of creating a scalable and streamlined process which doesn’t require labor intensive harvesting. The substrate is often recycled materials or food waste, with the exact contents specialised to whichever fungi are being grown.
The paste provides a nutrient-rich base for the mycelium, allowing it to grow thicker and faster than previous techniques. This also benefits the harvesting process, with the mycelium growing so strong that it no longer needs to be cut into smaller pieces in order to be harvested.
As research continues, mycelium leather is becoming more and more indistinguishable from traditional animal leather and its PVC alternatives. After production, mycelium leather can be dyed with a variety of methods and is both flexible and strong enough to be used wherever traditional leather is used. The leather is able to be grown to order, is completely carbon neutral, and can be designed to look like a variety of different leathers in both color and pattern.
So, what’s next for the researchers?
Currently, mycelium leather is considered a luxury product, on par with silk and cashmere, due to its rather intensive process. The University of Denver team wants to develop a less-intensive, more scalable solution that could be rolled out around the world to bring down this price and make mycelium leather accessible to the masses.
