Stella McCartney Reveals First Garments Made From Mushroom Leather
Mushroom leather goes mainstream as Stella McCartney reveals her first-ever garments made from mushrooms, while luxury brand Hermès also announces its first handbag using the sustainable material too.
Credit: Stella McCartney
The fashion industry is embracing mushroom leather as leading luxury brands Stella McCartney and Hermès both announce products using the innovative material within the same week.
The fabric feels and functions just like animal leather - but is instead grown from mushrooms. It is known as one of the future fabrics of the fashion industry, as innovative designers increasingly look towards sustainable alternatives to materials like leather and plastic.
Now, one of fashion’s noted champions of sustainability, Stella McCartney, has revealed her first garments using the fabric: a black bustier and utility pants set.
Credit: Stella McCartney
McCartney’s chosen brand of mushroom leather is produced by a company called Mylo, who intentionally designed the grow process to be low impact: Mylo’s mushroom leather takes less than two weeks to grow, and therefore emits far fewer greenhouse gases and uses less water and resources than animal leather.
“Many people associate leather with luxury but since the beginning I always wanted to approach things in a different way because killing animals for the sake of fashion is quite simply not acceptable”, explains fashion designer Stella McCartney.
The leading designer has long championed sustainability and animal-free fashion, with her namesake brand having been leather-, fur-, and feather-free since 2001.
Her latest launch is the first of a groundbreaking consortium between Mylo and four of the biggest brands in the world - Adidas, Lululemon, Kerin, and Stella McCartney. The consortium will push mushroom leather into the mainstream and help promote more sustainable options than animal leather to consumers.
And it seems other brands are already taking note. Luxury French brand Hermès - infamous for their use of crocodile, alligator, and snake skin in their collections - have announced their first ever bag made from mushroom leather.
The brand’s Victoria shopper bag has been reimagined with mushroom-based leather by MycoWorks.
Hermès’ mushroom leather Victoria bag. Credit: Coppi Barbieri
Hermès' decision to work with plant-leather is a huge sign that the fashion industry is moving away from exotic animal skins and animal leather and towards leathers made from plants.
And it’s not just the fashion industry ditching leather - even the car industry is embracing future-fabrics too. Iconic car company MINI recently announced that it will replace leather with inventive, recycled materials like cork for its future car interiors.
With more than a billion cows, pigs, goats, sheep, alligators, ostriches, kangaroos, and even dogs and cats cruelly slaughtered for their skins every year, a future free from animal-leather cannot arrive soon enough.
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An estimated two million wild kangaroos are slaughtered every year to produce “k-leather”, which is used in certain models of soccer cleats.