Biotextiles: making textiles in a context of climate and biodiversity emergency

This chapter examines key recent innovative bio-alternative textile materials and processes and proposes an analysis of their potential contribution to lessening the environmental impact of the textile industry. With the emergence of biodesign and biotextiles, new questions arise. How can biodesign help reshape the textile industry? Can design-led biology research be scaled up to leverage circular principles for the bioeconomy? And how can biodesign help address textile specific sustainable development goals? Section two situates textile material innovation in an environmental crisis context. Section three reviews the emergence of biodesign and its role in textile innovation, and section four explores biotextile strategies mapped against living systems and biomimicry principles.