Member of the Mylo consortium of the biofabrication company Bolt Threads with Kering, Lululemon and Stella McCartney, the German sportswear brand Adidas announced, at the end of last year, being working with the new vegan material Mylo, made from mycelium, the roots of the mushrooms.

By Ludmilla Intravaia

In this article :

• Adidas press release about the use of mycelium

• What is mycelium ?

• Biofabrication of unleather Mylo by Bolt Threads

• Stella McCartney and Mylo

• Mylo Consortium with Adidas, Kering, Lululemon and Stella McCartney

Wearing Adidas cruelty free mushroom sneakers will soon be possible. At least this is the announcement made by the German sportswear manufacturer on December 28, 2020: “Together with partners, adidas is developing a new material, a purely biological leather alternative made from mycelium, and will use it for the very first time in the creation of footwear ”, indicates the press release published on the website of the brand which also expresses its desire to contribute to animal welfare, in these terms:“ adidas has committed to 'Vier Pfoten', an animal protection organization, to completely ban furs from the manufacturing of its products.”

Mycelium is a complex network of subterranean fibers which ensures the growth of the mushrooms, that are its fruits. A vegan alter leather material made from mycelium, Mylo, was launched in 2018 by the American company Bolt Threads, founded in 2009, with the aim of creating, through biofabrication, textiles and materials derived from microorganisms and no longer petroleum or animals, in a sustainable and cruelty free perspective.

The fabrication of Mylo is explained on the Bolt Threads website, as follows: “We start by reproducing what happens under the forest floor in a controlled indoor environment. We take spores of mycelia cells and feed them sawdust and organic material, and place all of that on a square mat while controlling the humidity and temperature. The mycelium grows into a foamy layer — imagine a big bag of smushed marshmallows. Once the mycelium is harvested, we compost the leftover byproducts. We then process and dye that sheet of mycelium and it becomes the Mylo that gets used to make footwear, handbags, wallets, phone cases, etc.”

Already, in 2018, Stella McCartney designed in Mylo a prototype of her iconic Falabella bag, intended not to be marketed but to be presented at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, during the Fashioned from Nature exhibition, from April 28, 2018 until January 27, 2019. Bolt Threads launched, in June 2018, on the crowdfunding platform Kickstarter, its own Mylo model, the Driver Bag.

Bolt Threads, to which we also owe Microsilk , a thread replicating spider silk in 2017, announced in October 2020 the founding of the Mylo consortium, bringing together Adidas, the French luxury group Kering, the Canadian brand Lululemon and the house Stella McCartney who will have exclusive use of the innovative Mylo material, before it is made available to other brands and designers. “At this stage, we need large brands to help subsidize the massive costs that come with developing a novel process and building a supply chain to make Mylo at commercial scale” noted Bolt Threads, in a press release of December 19 : “Our consortium partners are enabling us to develop a process that will eventually produce a high quality leather alternative at a comparable price to leather hide. That’s going to take a few years but (…) in the meantime, we are working on making smaller quantities available to crafters and artisans via collaborations.” To learn more about Bolt Threads, watch the video below.

The Mylo products, for instance Adidas sneakers and Stella McCartney accessories, will be available this year, in stores and online.

* More info about Mylo on Bolt Threads website.

* Mylo Driver Bag on Kickstarter.

* More information about Vier Pfoten (Four Paws) on the website of this international organization for the protection of animals, founded in 1988 in Austria.

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