In the universe of “The Warp of Symbiogenesis,” a collection of woven fabrics unfolds, aiming to foster appreciation for the intricate interconnections among Earth’s organisms. These fabrics carry five stories of invisible connections, narrating tales of cooperation, exploitation, and competition among fungi, lichens, corals, and plants. Each symbiotic relationship inspires a distinct weaving pattern, symbolizing the unique interactions between two species. Crafted from natural fibers sourced in Europe, the textile collection invites a reconsideration of the impact and interdependence shared by all organic life forms.

How do we begin to listen to the stories of the planet? By being present in the interweaving of life, of which we are a part and always have been. As a queer speculator, designer, and researcher, Paul Schaffer is fascinated by the systems influencing our social behavior and relationship with nature. Concentrating on visual media and textiles, his work seeks to deconstruct and visually articulate the heteronormative nature of these systems. Motivated by profound curiosity and a love for research, Schaffer continually strives to comprehend systems in novel ways, addressing sensitive topics with utmost care.

Hemp: a truly versatile plant, once one of the main sources of man-made textiles. Today, most of us know it under the names “cannabis” or “marijuana”, which tend to evoke predominantly negative connotations. Design Academy Eindhoven alumna Natasha Amisha sought to investigate the source of this disconnect with her graduate project “Honestly Hemp”. Her vision: to create an entire outfit made wholly from hemp fibre and end the stigma surrounding the plant.

Natasha soon discovered that our tainted view of the hemp plant is mainly based on misconceptions, and that it could be a key ingredient in helping the textile industry become more sustainable. Not only is hemp a robust plant that thrives in diverse conditions, it also requires minimal water, is among nature’s strongest fibers, thus ensuring long-lasting life cycles, boosts sustainable agriculture as it enhances soil quality and is antibacterial, UV resistant and hypoallergenic. With “Honestly Hemp”, she has set out to place this fascinating natural material at the forefront of sustainable solutions for the future of the textile industry.

BIOBASE, a central project within the BIOTEXFUTURE cluster, introduces sustainable alternatives from available resources for textile applications with competitive costs and properties. The overarching BIOTEXFUTURE project, led by the Institute for Textile Technology at RWTH Aachen (ITA), the Chair for Technology and Organizational Sociology (STO) at RWTH Aachen, and sportswear manufacturer adidas, aims for the transition of the entire textile value
chain to biobased materials.

BIOBASE is motivated by the challenge of dependence on fossil raw materials in the production of synthetic polymers, which poses ecological, economic, and political risks. The project targets the establishment of biobased polymers in the textile industry, demonstrating their full potential. Key sectors of the German textile industry, including automotive, sportswear, interiors, and technical textiles, are the focal points.

Elizabeth Balado is an artist, designer, and researcher from London, presenting a unique, experientially-driven workshop with her project “Blooming Minds: Social Printing”. Developed over the past year, the workshop combines the psychological and physical benefits of nature with community-based creation, by guiding participants to create their own prints. The workshop encourages participants to follow their own intuition to select and forage flowers and plants and then arrange a composition, before using a technique to transfer the natural dye onto cotton using a mallet.

She will be presenting a variation of the workshop at the KEYHOUSE during Munich Fabric Start, which will consist of participants applying the print technique onto tote bags, allowing them to create and keep their own work. Elizabeth’s research focuses on combining nature – especially the use of natural and recycled materials – and community, a social practice which weaves themes such as mental health while encouraging accessible creativity. Her current work can be found on her Instagram and website. Elizabeth is open to collaboration with foragers, biologists, mental health services and others interested about participating in further printing workshops.

Suzanne Corcessin’s “Being Plucked” (“Être à Fleur de Peau”) utilizes unconventional textiles to argue against the notion that bird plucking and hair removal are neutral actions. Suzanne Corcessin views these acts as political, maintaining colonial and gendered hierarchies. Through bird plucking and the aesthetics of hair removal, bodies historically have been controlled and objectified.

The installation employs latex, textiles, silicone, and feathers to create textures that confront viewers with conflicting emotions, provoking new perspectives on the debate over hair removal. In this everyday decision and product debate, the question arises: Who decides what is right or wrong, beautiful or unattractive?

“Being Plucked” questions underlying assumptions and illuminates the political dimensions of decisions about one’s body. By creating textiles that evoke discomfort, Suzanne Corcessin urges a shift in the perception of the act of hair removal, breaking through the colonial and gendered structures often associated with this topic.

Lucas Fuhrmann, the visionary behind Revoltech, inaugurates a transformative era of presentation technology that amalgamates nature, technology, and sustainability. Through innovative light columns, he creates unique experiences that not only impress aesthetically but also underscore Revoltech’s
commitment to transparency and eco-friendliness.

The revolution of Revoltech lies in the use of Hemp-Leder, an advanced fusion of hemp fibers and traditional leather. This sustainable material choice reflects Revoltech’s endeavor to promote environmentally friendly and ethical practices. The physical location of Revoltech at Darmstadt, is not just a hub of progress but also a symbol of innovation and design.

To artist Sophie Conroy, her life is an experiment. In her latest work, she chose to live without her own house for 6 months in Eindhoven, on a quest to find more connected ways of living. During this time, she experienced living amidst chaos and connection. She found various forms of shelter and witnessed the beauty of her community. Through observing her fundamental human needs, she aims to grasp their authentic essence. Embracing the discomfort of houselessness allowed her to uncover valuable insights, challenging traditional notions of art, ownership, and community.

Textiles, for Sophie, become a medium that provides protection while revealing the vulnerability of the self. Confronting existential challenges during her houselessness, textiles transform into symbols of resilience and self-discovery.

Sophie crafts her textiles using primarily found materials, notably her own clothing. She believes in the power of textiles as a communication tool, using them to capture the essence of community and home. She peels away the capitalist consumer dimension of fabric, recognising it as a fundamental connection between body and environment.

Sophie Conroy doesn’t just create artworks; she constructs spaces for dialogue and interaction. Her installations incorporate videos, tapestries, drawings, writing and projections, creating a captivating fusion of textiles and visual art. The space and Sophie herself become part of the art, inviting observers to immerse themselves in this interactive environment.

Sophie emphasises that our focus should not be on designing more ‘stuff’ but on creating new perspectives and ways of seeing. Through creating tools to shift our perspectives, Sophie believes we can move away from the current patterns of exploitation, isolation, and consumption and towards societies grounded in trust, joy, and connection.

Cloudwool, presented by Martin Brambley, is an oasis of sustainability in the textile universe, introducing pure, local wool of new quality to the market. The projects name symbolises not just an island in the sky but also the unity of environmentally conscious production and high-quality materials.

In a time where natural wool is often imported and blended with synthetic fibers, Cloudwool relies on local resources and fights against the neglect of local sheep farmers’ wool. The sustainable angle of Cloudwool emerges from the desire to bring local fibers to the market in new and exciting forms. The 100% local wool, typically considered waste, is transformed into a super-soft and durable fabric through nonwoven technology – without burdening the environment. Natural, breathable, and comfortable, Cloudwool integrates the natural properties of wool into the material to make it as exceptional as possible.

Within the BIOTEXFUTURE cluster, the CO2Tex project introduces innovative paths for sustainable elastic yarns. In the context of the overarching BIOTEXTFUTURE project, the Institute for Textile Technology (ITA) and the Chair for Technology and Organizational Sociology (STO) at RWTH Aachen, together with adidas, strive to achieve the transition of the entire textile value chain to bio-based materials.

CO2Tex stands out as a central project within BIOTEXFUTURE, focusing on CO2-containing thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) as an alternative to conventional elastane. This project revolutionizes elastic yarn production by eliminating toxic solvents, not only reducing environmental impact but also enabling potential industrial mass production.

Flax was traditionally grown as a crop in the Netherlands, and Dutch linen was one of the most sought-after for a long time because of its good quality. Today that is no longer the case. Therefore, in 2018, Crafts Council Nederland, in cooperation with the Fashion Design Master of ArtEZ University, initiated ‘The Linen Project’ to revive the economic viability of local flax cultivation and linen production in the Netherlands, while transforming it in a sustainable way.

Local and recycled: Enschede Textielstad was founded in 2013 by Annemieke Koster to create responsibly produced fabrics from recycled yarns and local raw materials such as flax, hemp and wool for apparel and interior textiles. To keep the supply chain as short and regional as possible, one of the main focuses of the concept is to develop smart and circular uses of waste streams and local resources – for example, Dutch wool. Its quality is not good enough to make clothes from, and to date there has been no viable business model in sight for this resource – so it has been burned. However, what is not good enough for clothing may be absolutely sufficient for other purposes, so Enschede Textielstad now weaves fabrics from the wool that are ideal for upholstered furniture.

The same applies to linen – there have been no projects with economic viability in the Netherlands to date. To change this, The Linen Project was founded in 2019 as an initiative of Crafts Council Nederland and ArtEZ University of Fine Arts (see feature in also this Sustainable Innovations issue). In 2020, the two projects began a collaboration based on division of labor, with Enschede Textielstad acting as a weaving mill for flax cultivated in the Netherlands.

From old to new: Pre-Loved is a biotextile concept in which new products are created from used post-consumer textile waste. In a unique production process, low-quality mixed textile fibres are transformed into a robust, paper- and leather-like material that is suitable for a variety of applications – from fashion to interior design and product design.

Designer Sarmite Polakova gives waste a new meaning in this context: instead of something negative, she perceives it as a surplus recyclable material that can, however, at the same time be a resource for the creation of something new – the focus here is on circularity: it is about the recyclability of the material; a product made by Studio Sarmite can be dissolved at the end of its life and the textile fibres can be used for the next production cycle. The lightweight material displays a processuality, revealing a new aesthetic and highlighting each previous life of a worn garment through nuances of colour and texture. It can feature marble-like patterns as well as hues accentuated by natural dyes.

Bio-based, locally produced, on demand: that’s MYCOTEX by NEFFA – a flexible material whose properties lie somewhere between leather, plastic and artificial leather. Production takes place in three steps: First, customisable and/or recyclable forms are created in an automated 3D design process. With the help of liquid fermentation, innovative materials are produced – the technique works for mycelium, but is also suitable for other biomaterials. In the end, the final textiles are produced by robotic applications without any weaving, cutting or sewing. In this way, the modelling process is similar to the injection moulding process – except that only natural materials are used instead of plastics.

More than Mycelium: At the beginning of the project, founder Aniela Hoitink focused in particular on the material MYCOTEX. Within the last three years, this has developed into NEFFA, a completely automated manufacturing method for different types of biomaterials. NEFFA stands for New Fashion Factory. The innovative system is based on automation, can be recycled and offers unlimited freedom of design. The patented process offers unprecedented design freedom to create silhouettes and textures that would never have been possible with traditional manufacturing methods and creates a local and completely transparent process that can be adapted to constant changes. For the textiles of tomorrow.

Textiles as witnesses of time: SLOW PATTERNS is a collection by the Berlin studio Meyers & Fügmann that changes over time due to the influence of sunlight. This works by using an unconventional technique that combines the natural and the artificial. In concrete terms, this means that European is woven and dyed in Europe by hand, with the side effect of preserving traditional skills of the European textile industry. The collection combines wool with synthetic yarns. When the textiles are exposed to UV light, the natural dyes fade over time, while the stable synthetic colours retain their shades, changing the materials and eventually revealing delicate patterns.

When the programmers of KNITWEAR LAB teamed up with 3D software specialists, a completely new idea for more sustainable, cost-efficient and design-oriented pattern development and knitwear production emerged. By combining virtual and material knitting, it is possible to reduce the massive waste during the pattern and pre-production phase in the industry and to further advance knitwear development with the help of smart technologies. Knitting on a new level: The revolutionary aspect of the method is the combination of innovative-virtual 3D technology with classic-conventional knitwear. The virtual design can be implemented exactly as you see it, while the actual knitted fabric that you perceive haptically and visually can be virtualised exactly as it was knitted.

Every year, more than 120 million tons of textile fibers are processed worldwide – more than a third of them are petroleum-based synthetic fibers, i.e. resource- and emission-intensive, causing waste and polluting the environment. An alternative is needed. But: Where do the fibers for the clothes of the future come from – are textiles that grow on trees or shoes that come from the sea a pure utopia?

If you think that “GOLD” by WINT Design Lab was inspired by the shiny precious metal, you’re wrong – the design research project draws its inspiration from the outer tissue layer of the cow’s intestine. This extremely thin, elastic and tear-resistant membrane, also called gold beater’s skin, was used in the past as a separating layer when beating gold leaf.

Product designers Robin Hoske and Felix Rasehorn, founders of WINT Design Lab, together with Mimotype Technologies, saw the potential in the material to create durable and recyclable high-performance textiles free of plastic.

Dyes play a major role in our daily lives – in the clothes we wear, the cosmetics we use or the food we eat. Most of the dyes we use are of synthetic origin,  which poses potential health risks – both in the manufacturing process and in the dyeing process or use. In addition, dyes and pigments in industrial wastewater are not infrequently released into the environment, where they remain and damage ecosystems.

MycoColors, a project by designer Birke Weber and biochemist Friederike Hoberg, addresses precisely this problem. The two are researching the potential of alternative dyes – specifically: from fungi. With MycoColors, they want to develop optimal growth conditions for colour-producing mycelium with the aim of creating a sustainable extraction of dyes and an innovative dyeing process and establishing fungal dyes in the textile and fashion industry. Because: fungi offer a lively, broad colour spectrum that runs through all the colours of the rainbow and is far from being exhausted

A world where everything is becoming faster, more connected and more digital, endless possibilities are emerging. But why always strive for the new instead of continuing the traditional?

Designer Camille Champion has taken note of this development and, during a stay in South Korea, set out to revive interest in  traditional craftsmanship.

To save this cultural heritage from extinction, Camille Champion has launched the “Twist and Roll” project, bringing the reuse of newspaper waste to create new objects into a modern Western context: to pass on the craft, the designer has set up a series of workshops to give school children a connection to this tradition. She has designed a small weaving tutorial to teach children to make their own paper threads, weave them on a loom and then collectively build a tent-like structure for their classroom. Twist and Roll combines sustainability, creativity, craft skills and teamwork to show how the education system can benefit from crafts.