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Traditional cow leather has a high environmental cost. Forests are cleared for grazing, feedlots produce concentrated waste, and methane emissions contribute significantly to climate change. Tanning is water-intensive, and colouring often relies on toxic synthetic dyes. For textile and apparel companies, these challenges are not just environmental, they’re business risks, from compliance pressures to consumer scrutiny.

Enter bacterial leather, or bacterial cellulose (BC). Already celebrated as a sustainable alternative, it’s now becoming smarter and cleaner. Researchers at Imperial College London, led by Prof. Tom Ellis and Dr. Kenneth Walker, have engineered a strain of Komagataeibacter rhaeticus that not only produces BC sheets but also colours them naturally, eliminating the need for harmful dyes.

Here’s the process in textile terms: bacteria are grown for 14 days to form flexible BC sheets. Then, a specially formulated solution triggers the microbes to produce eumelanin, a natural black pigment. Within 48 hours, the material is permanently black - no fading, no wastewater, no chemical processing. After mild sterilisation and shaping, the sheets can be sewn into wallets, shoes, or other leather goods. In long-term tests, the colour remained intact even after 42 months of use.

And black is just the beginning. The team is developing bacteria that respond to light patterns, allowing designers to “print” logos or multicolour designs directly into the material. For textile and fashion companies, this means precision customisation at the microbial level, a capability that could redefine leather and technical textile applications.

For the textile sector, the implications are significant:

Sustainability: Reduces water, chemical, and livestock impact—key for ESG compliance.

Innovation: Opens doors to bio-fabricated, high-performance materials.

Design Freedom: Grow colour, patterns, and textures directly into the material.

Market Advantage: Aligns with consumer demand for eco-conscious, functional, and aesthetic products.

As the boundaries between material science, biotechnology, and textiles blur, innovations like bacterial leather are not a distant novelty, they are the future of fashion and technical textiles. Brands and manufacturers that adopt these methods early could gain a first-mover advantage in sustainability, performance, and design flexibility.

“Microbes are already solving many of the problems of animal and plastic-based leather,” Ellis notes. “We plan to expand into new colours, materials, and patterns—and work with the fashion industry to make production greener from start to finish.”

For textile leaders, it’s time to pay attention: the next revolution in leather isn’t made in tanneries, it’s grown in a lab.