Mycelium, kombucha, algae, cork, apple, pineapple ... Let’s discover the new materials that we will wear tomorrow, at the Bourgoin-Jallieu museum exhibit on the future of fashion, in Isère. 

By Ludmilla Intravaia 

1/3 - Le Boudoir Numérique takes you on a tour of the exhibit Mode au futur, fruit of the Bourgoin-Jallieu museum's partnership, in Isère, with the Austrian designer Anna-Barbara Aumüller which illustrates, with a plethora of examples to back it up, the wealth of cutting-edge techniques and avant-garde research, at the service of fashion evolution. Follow the guide ! 

Organic 3D printing 

This silk dress, adorned with gold leaf by the Parisian gilder Atelier Thiery, was created using a patented technique from the company Sericyne specialized in the fabrication of a natural non-woven silk, directly by the silkworms. In the factory of the French company, located in the Cévennes, the silkworms are placed on two or three-dimensional supports, on which they spin their silk. The silk is harvested from the supports, once they are covered. The worms therefore do not make a cocoon but reproduce the shapes of the molds on which they are placed, thus generating 2D surfaces or 3D objects. In addition to its site in Occitanie comprising fields of mulberry trees, a silkworm breeding building and a silk production workshop, the company Sericyne is located on the Parisian startup campus Station F for its commerce and communication activities. 

Also presented in the exhibition, this two-tone dress in Ahimsa silk, a silk obtained, not by the traditional method, from cocoons of silkworms steamed and then boiled but from cocoons no longer containing silkworms.

Cork worked like textile

This oversized coat is made with cork made by the Portuguese company Sedacor which, since 1924, specializes in the sustainable production of this material developed from the bark of cork oak, cultivated in a sustainable way, in forests in Portugal. Non-brittle and flexible enough to be used as a textile, the cork of the coat is printed with patterns, coupled with flexible wooden inserts. This innovative type of cork appears to be a disruptive future alternative to animal leathers, especially exotic skins used for leather goods, in the perspective of a cruelty free and vegan fashion. 

Another alternative to animal leather or synthetic materials, the wood skin developed by the French designer Chloé de la Chaise, for example in this pair of rain boots made with wood skin and wood fibers.

The exhibition also highlights alter-leather solutions from food waste, such as Piñatex made from pineapple fibers or Apple Skin from the Italian company Frumat.

Biofabrication applied to fashion 

The culture of materials with living cells is booming in the fashion world, where the use of bacteria, yeasts, fungi or algae to create new textiles and dyes has become the subject of research from designers. For instance, the German biodesigner Carolyn Raff used algae, more exactly a jelly-like substance extracted from red algae, agar-agar, to make biodegradable biopolymers, which she cuts into different shapes, to create decorative flowers, as one can see on the shirt dress below.

In the photo below, a cellulose mask, made by the process of kombucha scoby fermentation. Signed by the designer Surzhana Raduaeva, it is accompanied by a top and skirt, resulting from Fungus Sapiens research on mycelium, the roots of mushrooms. This French company has given itself the mission of cultivating compostable biomaterials, which could eventually replace plastic and animal leather in fashion, an approach offering stimulating prospects for a more sustainable textile industry,  hopefully more respectful of the environment and the sentient beings.

Note that the temporary exhibition Mode au Futur is part of the scenography of the permanent collections of the Bourgoin-Jallieu museum dedicated to the history of textile in the Rhône-Alpes region. An opportunity to study the know-how passed down from generation to generation in the department of Isère, from the first printing stamps, through the looms, to the most recent computer technologies.

Discover the exhibition Mode au futur in the presentation video below.

* The exhibition Mode au futur runs until August 22, 2021, at the Bourgoin-Jallieu museum. More info here.

* The catalog of the exhibition Mode au futur, fashion evolution by Anna-Barbara Aumüller and Gaétan Anaërlin is published by Modefenster AT Editions (60 euros). Available at the museum reception desk.

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