BIOTEXFUTURE: How to Make Textiles from Fossils
One of fashion’s biggest contradictions is that it relies on fossil fuels. Polyester, nylon, and acrylic make up most of the world’s fibres, which means that most clothes today start out as crude oil. adidas and RWTH Aachen University are leading the German project BIOTEXFUTURE, which wants to end that dependence.
The program is a group of businesses and universities working together to find scalable, bio-based alternatives. It is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. Part of the SUSTAINABLE INNOVATIONS forum at Munich Fabric start, three main projects will be featured:
- CircWool: a process that uses a solvent to restore wool fibres without lowering their quality.
- BioPETex: a bio-based polyester that works just as well as regular PET.
- BioCushion: a type of spacer fabric that can be recycled and used in shoes and clothes. It is both strong and circular.
These projects are not meant to be one-time tests; they are meant to be useful in the real world. Adding them to the forum ties speculative design ideas to a long history of applied science. It reminds us that we need both creativity and infrastructure to make the switch to sustainable textiles.
BioCushion
BioPEtex
BioPEtex
BioPEtex
CircWool
BIOTEXFUTURE is holding the right vision to transform the textile value chain.”
adidas Future Team
The message is clear for fashion and textiles: greenwashing can’t hide the fact that we depend on oil. We need to change the way things are built, and bio-based fibres are a big part of that. The good news is that the technology is available, partnerships are forming, and interest is growing.
Petrochemistry has defined textiles for the last 100 years. But projects like BIOTEXFUTURE show that a new era is coming, one where performance, style, and scale are no longer tied to oil but to renewable innovation.
CircWool
CircWool
CircWool
Visit BIOTEXFUTURE H2 | SI
THIS MIGHT BE ALSO INTERESTING FOR YOU
MUNICH FABRIC START – January 26 closing report
A solid trade show. An optimistic mindset. That sums up the outcome of MUNICH FABRIC START. After three days, the Munich textile fair came to an end yesterday, Thursday, with the integrated show-in-shows BLUEZONE, KEYHOUSE and THE SOURCE. MUNICH FABRIC START concluded with a stable visitor frequency compared to the previous event.
MUNICH FABRIC START – Between Attitude and Sensuality
The future begins where we reimagine it. The overarching theme of PLEASURE stands for fashion as an emotional space, as an expression of attitude and cultural reflection.
KnitForm+ by Jeanne Mora – SUSTAINABLE INNOVATIONS
What matters is how the textile responds: how it regulates volume, distributes pressure, and transitions from flat to three-dimensional states. Process transparency is embedded in the methodology itself.
Cartoon – WEAR YOUR OPTIMISM
Embark on this fashionable journey and discover the new Cartoon collection at our store. Be inspired, mix and match to your heart's content, and wear optimism—every day, for every occasion.
RETRAKT – SUSTAINABLE INNOVATIONS
Performance, in this context, is measured by organisational resilience. RETRAKT applies resilience engineering to help employees anticipate, monitor, respond to, and learn from complex and changing requirements.
MATERIA FUTURA – SUSTAINABLE INNOVATIONS
Materia Futura is not proposing a new bio-material category, nor a finished commercial textile. What distinguishes the project is its design-led investigation into the emotional and aesthetic dimensions of bio-based materials, an area often sidelined in sustainability discourse.
THREADED PROTOCOLS – SUSTAINABLE INNOVATIONS
Threaded Protocols is not a textile innovation in the commercial sense, nor a digital tool disguised as craft. What makes the work distinct is its material investigation into how computational logic originates in textile practice and what is lost when those logics are abstracted into opaque technological systems.
MARIE VILAY – SUSTAINABLE INNOVATIONS
Marie Vilay does not present a new fabric or production technique. What distinguishes her work is a method of reading and translating textile knowledge across cultures, systems, and moments of transition.
Interview with Simon Angel, Curator of SUSTAINABLE INNOVATIONS
Each season, the Sustainable Innovations forum brings together projects that provoke, inspire, and challenge assumptions. This year is no exception, with work ranging from bio-luxury couture to energy-generating textiles and regenerative materials grown from wetlands.
MUNICH FABRIC START – September 25 closing report
At its 56th edition, MUNICH FABRIC START reinforced its clear positioning. Over two days, the Munich textile trade show brought the fashion industry together with its four show-in-show formats.