Will we wear clothes made from oyster mushrooms, tinder fungus and kombucha in the future?

The water and CO₂ balance of conventional textile production is devastating, and the debate about more sustainability has long since reached the industry.

Materials made from mycelia, the robust, filamentous tissues of fungi, would be more environmentally friendly.

Cora Schmelzer already dealt with the possibilities they offer and how aesthetically they can be designed in her diploma thesis.

The 30-year-old studied industrial design at the Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences and completed a master's degree in "Leadership in the Creative Industries".

Now she is looking for comrades-in-arms to realize her mushroom ideas in the fashion and construction industry.

For Schmelzer, products have to “feel good, look good, have high user quality”.

Since her Erasmus study visit to Paris at the École Nationale Supérieure de Création Industrielle, aesthetics have been just as important to her as environmental compatibility.

"I only wear secondhand clothes or clothes from sustainable labels."

Textiles from fungal cultures are not a new invention.

Researchers from the University of Minnesota found that Native Americans in Alaska were making bags and clothes from it more than a hundred years ago.

There are companies around the world that have discovered mycelia as a substitute for textiles, leather or plastic.

The US company Ecovative, for example, wants to grow mushroom leather on a large scale, and the start-up Mycotech is working on it in Indonesia.

In Germany and the Netherlands, too, there are designers like Aniela Hoitink who create fabrics and clothes from mycelium.

Non-toxic and skin-friendly

Materials made from mushrooms are not only sustainable.

They are also non-toxic, skin-friendly, antibacterial, lightweight and very stable.

The rapidly renewable raw material is biodegradable, says Schmelzer.

Heat – around 100 degrees in the oven – stops the growth of the fungi and makes the material durable.

"The idea is really great," she says, but she doesn't like the results so far.

"I find a lot of things ugly," she admits frankly.

Most people associate mushrooms with a rather strange feeling – cool, spongy, maybe even disgusting.

For the Darmstadt designer, it is therefore all about acceptance: "Do I want to let this material touch my skin?" She developed her own aesthetic ideas.

Schmelzer experimented with mushroom cultures in her student apartment and in her parents' basement in Ingelheim.

She worked with different species: oyster mushrooms, kombucha, tinder fungus and Schizophyllum commune, the common fissure.

She ordered the ingredients online.

On a mixture with sugar and green tea, she grew kombucha in petri dishes and then also in large plastic boxes.

An area of ​​one square meter grows in two weeks.

"The conditions in the boiler room were good at 23 degrees," she says with a laugh.

Mushroom skins about a centimeter thick formed, which she pulled onto frames and dried.

The skins can be sewn together with thread, "but you can also specify the shape and let the mushroom grow into it".

Completely without seams.

"Alternatively, spray the mushroom culture directly onto a tailor's dummy," she suggests.

Her lace blouse, which she made from delicate beige kombucha fabric, shows that mushroom dresses can look like haute couture.

She plied the dried material with oil and lasered a fan-shaped pattern into it.

Schmelzer designed an entire collection: blouses, skirts, pullovers, caps and shoes made from different mushroom materials.

Deceptively similar to leather

Some things shine like silk because they have been treated with glycerine, others look deceptively like leather.

What does a kombucha blouse feel like?

Initially parchment-like, says the young designer.

But oil makes the material flexible.

The fabrics made of tinder sponge or split leaf are as fluffy as "soft suede".

As far as possible, Schmelzer produced the materials himself. Kombucha or oyster mushrooms were easy because they don't need laboratory conditions.

She made the heels of the shoes from oyster mushrooms, to which she mixed sawdust and hamster straw.

This grew into a stable block that looks like camembert.

The leather substitute made from split leaves needs clean room conditions, tinder fungus can be harvested in the forest.

Schmelzer is convinced of the ecological advantages.

The production of a conventional T-shirt uses around 5000 liters of water, plus fertilization of the cotton fields and pollution from bleaching and dyeing.

The designer used the natural colors of the mushrooms for her textiles, for example the flamingo oyster mushroom is salmon pink.

The materials can be colored with plant colors.

The designer sees a need for research when it comes to cleaning, water would soften the materials again.

Schmelzer would like to set up a start-up for her products - for the fashion industry, but also for the construction industry.

“Current insulation material on the market is flammable, non-recyclable and sometimes toxic.

Mushroom cultures interspersed with straw or sawdust, on the other hand, are sustainable and very robust.” What she lacks are staff and sufficient start-up capital.

But she is convinced: "If the right people came together, it would certainly be a success."