Mycelium Textile Upholstering: Scaling strategies for bio-leather applications

This study explores methods for laminating and myco-welding pure mycelium leather sheets, providing a comprehensive approach to fabricating large-scale mycelium-based textiles. Techniques such as multi-layer lamination with pure mycelium pellicles and combinations of natural and synthetic fibers are investigated to enhance material strength. The method overcomes associated contamination risks of mycelium leather growth and demonstrates a three-week growing period using various types of waste, indicating a significant decrease in the production time compared to animal-derived leather. These methods aim to solve challenges in the open-source decentralized large-scale production of continuous mycelium leather sheets by creating biological patchworks via grafting of smaller units. The study demonstrates ways to join pure mycelium leather units to generate extensive nonwoven mycelium textiles suitable for the construction industry. The work addresses issues related to continuous sheet production on a large scale and the repair of damaged landscapes via the bio-remediation potentials of these emerging textile alternatives. The paper also showcases the creation of three-dimensional leather upholstery and the use of this product for interior architecture applications and proposes a counter approach to widely accepted planned obsolescence strategies. The fabrication potential of the work is demonstrated through a prototype titled “Second Skin” which acts as a sustainable alternative to traditional interior textiles that meets specific material property behaviors and offers aesthetic flexibility, the chair being the first of a series of interior studies. The study highlights the scalability of mycelium leather production and the potential for these materials to reimagine interior aesthetics and design applications.