On a parlé beaucoup de cuirs vegan, de cuirs végétaux… mais peu d’entre nous connaissent vraiment la différence. On a vu apparaître le cuir d’ananas (le Pinatex), qui a ensuite ouvert la porte à de nombreux autres types de cuir issus de plantes. Aujourd’hui je souhaitais faire le point sur les nouveaux textiles alternatifs, en espérant vous en apprendre plus.
Une des précurseur de ce nouveau secteur se nomme Dr Carmen Hijosa, inventrice du Pinatex fin 90 début 2000, à l’origine du cuir en fibre d’ananas. Suite à une expérience en tant que consultante maroquinerie aux Philipinnes, elle va établir le constat douloureux que le cuir produit là-bas est de mauvaise qualité, non durable et son tannage est dangereux pour la santé des travailleurs. En effet, 80% de l’industrie du cuir utilise le chrome et d’autres métaux lourds pour tanner leurs peaux, relâchant de grandes quantités de produits chimiques contribuant largement à la pollution des eaux. Elle va donc s’inspirer d’un vêtement traditionnel local, le Barong Tagalog, fait en fibre d’ananas, pour créer un cuir d’ananas. Avant d’y arriver, elle va mener une recherche de 7 ans dans le cadre d’un doctorat au Royal College of Art. En quoi ce textile est plus responsable qu’un coton par exemple ? Car il ne requiert pas de production, il est issu de déchets. Chaque année, plusieurs dizaines de milliers de tonnes de feuilles d’ananas sont gâchées après la récolte, laissé à l’abandon sur place ou brulées, Carmen Hijosa a donc eu l’idée de réutiliser ces déchets grâce au feutrage de fibres, créant ainsi un substrat qui formera par la suite le PInatex.
We talk a lot of vegan leather, vegetal leather... but few among us really know the difference. Last years, we've seen new leathers coming on the market, such as the Pineapple leather (Pinatex), which had open the door to a bench of other leather types made from plants. Today, I would like to highlight this new industry, hoping to teach you more.
One of the first innovator on this sector is Dr Carmen Hijosa, inventor of the Pinatex in the end of the 90's, beginning of 2000, at the origin of the pineapple fiber leather. After an experience as a leather consultant in the Philippines, she makes the painful observation that leathers produced there are of bad quality, non-sustainable, and that tanning processes are dangerous for worker's health. Indeed, 80% of the leather industry uses chrome and other heavy metals for tanning the skins, releasing large amounts of chemical products and contributing largely to water pollution. She will be inspired from a local traditional costume, the Baron Tagalog, made from pineapple fibers, to create a pineapple leather. Before succeeding in her project, she will lead a 7 years research in the context of a PHD at the Royal College of Art. In which this textile is more responsible than a cotton, for example? It does not required production, it is made from waste. Each year, several tens of thousands of tons of pineapple leaves are wasted after the harvest, left on site or burned. So, Carmen Hijosa had the idea to reuse these wastes thanks to the fiber felting process, creating a substrate that would later form the Pinatex.
In this context, appeared new type of leathers such as the Muskin, made from mushroom, more soft, the finish is closer to a suede leather. This fabric has been developed by Gardo Zero Innovation, it is obtained though the cultivation of a mushroom, named Phelinus Ellipsoideus, on a textile like hem or linen. Both material merge and hardens, letting appearing only mushroom spores. This fabric has the advantage to absorb the humidity and release it, conferring to this leather anti-bacterial properties, so this leather can be used in contact to skin for exemple.
In 2014, Orange fiber was born, which, like Pinatex, reuses the waste from the food industry. Since the peel if citrus fruits is discarded after juice extraction, this industry releases a huge amount of waste. The wasted biomass could be used wisely. This is this challenge taken up by this Italian company. The fiber produced thanks to industrial process is light and soft as a silk. It can offers various finishes, shiny or matte, at be mixed with other fibers to create different texture results.
In 2019, has been created Desserto, a leather made from Nopal, a variety of cactus. This brand is born from two Mexican entrepreneurs using dry cactus's leaves in their formula. However, hard to have more information on the production process after the harvest and on the transformation process. Their communication put the emphasis on the cultivation and the natural drying process of the leaves but does not communicate on the production process. Hard to make an clear judgment on the fabric. However, the result if very interesting, the leather is soft and light.
These new fabrics come from new processes without weaving. It would be interesting to come back on this topic in an upcoming article on the fabrics made from natural fibers. The history can teach us a lot.
But this is very important to not let us be lost in the semantic, which can be confusing. Let's take for example the leather industry. Vegan leather includes both synthetic leather made from plastic materials and natural leather made from vegetal materials. Thus, vegan leather is not always synonym of responsible leather. This is the same regarding the vegetal leathers, which are not synonyms of leather made from vegetal materials. The vegetal leather is in fact a classic leather from animals including a vegetal tanning process. Thus, the vegetal leather is not vegan but more responsible than a classic leather, the vegetal tanning process does not uses heavy metals but instead uses the tannins present in the bark and sap of plants. Different types of tannins are used according to the expected result.
