Potential applications for mycelium materials are endless
Ecovative is the mycelium technology company that designs and grows sustainable materials that come straight from nature. By up-cycling the byproducts of agriculture, the New York-headquartered company replaces plastics, leather, meat, and other unsustainable products of industry and factory farming. Ecovative’s co-founder and chief commercial officer Gavin McIntyre speaks to Fibre2Fashion about mycelium and its present and future applications.
How did you come up with the idea of using mycelium for textile materials?
My fellow co-founder, Eben Bayer, was born and raised on a farm in Vermont, where he first noticed mycelium holding the rich soil together. We met at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in an innovation workshop taught by Professor Burt Swersey. As part of the course, Professor Swersey challenged us to develop a meaningful solution to a current problem facing the world, and Eben remembered mycelium, and how it binds organic matter together. We saw an exciting opportunity to grow completely natural materials to replace plastics and other materials, and our professor agreed, encouraging us to turn the idea into a company, which is now Ecovative.
How much time did it take for the first prototype? What was the material used for?
The first prototype took about a week to grow, which took place underneath Eben’s dorm room bed. It was made from wood chips inoculated with mycelium, taking the form of a small puck about the size of a cookie. This basic material — what we now call MycoComposite — was used to prove the concept, and originally, we pursued the idea of replacing wood, insulation and other construction materials. Soon we realised the best market to tackle first was plastic packaging, which is what our Mushroom Packaging division does now.
What are the applications of mycelium in fashion and textiles?
The potential applications really are endless. The ones we’re pursuing most fervently right now are in leather-like hides, which can be used in fashion, automotive, and accessories, as well as technical foams for support and insulation in things like shoes and handbags. We produce both product types with the same underlying technology, what we call AirMycelium, which produces pure mycelium in large-format sheets that are grown to specification for their intended use.
Is mass production possible? What is the time taken to grow for instance something equal to a metre of fabric?
Mass production is possible and necessary to making a positive impact in the world. At Ecovative we are currently building the capacity to produce these materials at commercial scale. It currently takes nine days to grow a sheet of mycelium material that is 2 metres wide by 20 metres long, useful for any application. Compare that to the time and embodied energy represented by a cow, or a tree, or for the fossil fuels from which plastics are made. The potential difference this could make for our environment is profound.
What are the challenges? How do you plan to overcome them?
Scale is the biggest challenge we face, along with everyone else in the biotech industry. Having already developed our technology and established numerous brand partnerships, it’s the one we’re most focused on solving at this stage. Our approach to the problem involves vertical integration — handling as many of the steps and raw material inputs as we can, instead of contracting to other companies — and also through our Foundry programme. Ecovative’s Mycelium Foundry takes the material specifications needed by a partner of client, quickly determines the right strain of fungi and the proper growing conditions to produce a material with the desired qualities. That material is tested at bench scale, then moves to pilot scale and commercial scale as the material development progresses to meet the customer’s specifications. Our commercial production is currently scaling up by an order of magnitude in factories we are commissioning this year. This means that by the time we reach full scale production, we would have tested and de-risked the process in every step along the way.
Which major brands have you collaborated with and for what kinds of products?
Our first round of collaborators and partners were companies like Dell and Ikea, with an emphasis on packing and construction materials, as well as a network of licensees that included Bolt Threads, with whom we developed an early version of mycelium-based leather. More recently, through the Fashion for Good Cooperative, our fashion and apparel division — Forager — has partnered with leading companies such as PVH, Bestseller, VivoBarefoot, and Wolverine, with additional world-class brands to be announced soon, focused on leather-like hides and elastomeric foams for use in clothing, apparel, automotive and other applications. These partnerships are essential to our process, by combining our expertise in mycelium with our brand partners’ knowledge of their markets, supply chains, and customer expectations.
What are the current applications and what can be expected in future?
The potential applications for mycelium materials are essentially endless. As far as where they have already proven their potential, it is in insulation, packaging, sound absorbing panels, construction materials, wood replacement, leather-like hides, elastomeric foams, and whole protein foods, to name a few. In the future, we can see mycelium playing a key role in a biomaterials ecosystem that draws from and sustains natural processes.
Which are your major markets?
Our major markets at this moment are protective packaging with Mushroom Packaging, plant-based meat (for example, with MyForest Foods’s MyBacon), and now the fashion, apparel and automotive markets with Forager.
What new applications or experiments are you carrying out with mycelium?
We have an active R&D pipeline with more exciting things coming, but scale is our core focus right now.
When do you think mycelium-based fashion products will be available in stores worldwide?
The technology and the market for these materials is moving fast, and products are already beginning to arrive on shelves. Products made with mycelium are now starting to become available to consumers, although mostly in the luxury market at first. In the next few years, it will grow increasingly common. It has taken about 15 years to bring these materials and technologies to commercial viability, and it may take another 15 or so before mycelium is as common as — or more common than — standard textiles like leather and plastic foams.
Published on: 17/06/2022
DISCLAIMER: All views and opinions expressed in this column are solely of the interviewee, and they do not reflect in any way the opinion of Fibre2Fashion.com.
