Search
Search
Search
Sophie Benson
They sustain natural cycles, form diverse materials, tackle our unwanted waste, and teach us lessons about efficiency. We’re certain that any designer looking to free themselves from the confines of plastic will be enthralled by this incredible organism.
Flora and Fauna – plants and animals - have long been known as the major building blocks of nature, and most living things have been categorised as one or the other. But now a third F has joined the line-up: Funga, the category under which all fungi fall.
It took 60 years of effort, during which time Fungi were incorrectly classified as flora, and then as nothing at all, but fungi finally have their own ecological kingdom (or queendom, as some phrase it).
It’s a huge step forwards in being able to formally classify, describe, and protect fungi, as integral conservation organisations like the IUCN and Re:wild now recognise funga as a category. It’s also an opportunity to truly understand and appreciate the breadth and wonder of fungi; their capacity to both rot and regenerate, their far-reaching material potential, and their place as the driving, connecting force for nature.
The funga kingdom encompasses mushrooms, moulds, yeasts, mildews, and more. A fungus can be mould on a slice of bread, a bright purple frill sprouting from the undergrowth, or a meaty plate protruding from a tree.
Apart from yeast, which grows as single cells, most fungi grow from filaments called hyphae. Hyphae branch out and form a network-like mass called mycelium. Mycelium is the root-like structure beneath the soil while mushrooms, which are also formed by hyphae, can be considered the ‘fruit’.
Mycelial walls are reinforced with chitin - the same polymer in insect exoskeletons - and the tightly packed, complex web naturally expands into available space, maximising surface area. These properties make mycelium an ideal candidate for lightweight, mould-formed materials and structures.
To ‘eat’, fungi secrete enzymes into the environment in or on which they are growing. The enzymes digest the food which is then absorbed by the hyphae. This breaking down of organic matter and release of nutrients into the soil puts fungi at the centre of natural decomposition and makes them vital for ecosystems. Without them forest floors would be piled high with dead plant matter, nutrients wouldn’t be recycled into the wider natural community, and “life as we know it would cease to exist”.
Fungi are among the most widely distributed organisms on earth. There are thought to be six times more species of fungi than plants, the total estimated at between 2.2 and 3.8 million. But there are only 120,000 accepted species at current. “There’s this whole dimension to the living world that we overlook. It's ancient and fundamental, and yet also a space of so much discovery and possibility. That's the magical mixture,” says Doug Bierand, author of In Search of Mycotopia.
For those who want to discover, fungi are everywhere. Take a step in the forest and there are 300 miles of fungi beneath your foot. In fact, there are more organisms living in a gram of soil than there are humans on earth. But don’t let that fool you into thinking all fungi are small. They can be microscopic, but fungi are explorers and can expand in their habitat. If you untangled the mycelium found in a teaspoon’s worth of soil and laid it end to end, it could stretch up to 10 kilometres. The biggest organism on earth is not a whale, but a mushroom forming fungus which colonised 1000 hectares of forest in Oregon.
Most of us know tree and plant roots take nutrients from the ground, but it’s a lesser-known fact that this couldn’t happen without fungi. Mycorrhizal fungi are found in the soil where all plants grow, and a symbiotic relationship exists between the two. Plants get nutrients from the fungi, and in return the fungi receive carbon, using it to grow their mycelial networks, therefore sequestering it in the soil. Billions of tons of carbon flows from plants to fungi every year, making soil the second-largest carbon sink after oceans. A particular type of root fungi within this ‘wood wide web’, ectomycorrhizal fungi, is even helping trees absorb CO2 faster. Soils that are dominated by the fungi contain 70% more carbon than those that aren’t.
Around 90% of land plants form symbiotic relationships with mycorrhizal fungi. The fungi help suppress diseases and pathogens and they provide the organic ‘glue’ which binds soil together. For this reason, they are an important piece of the puzzle for a plethora of plastic-free materials outside the world of funga too, from wood to cotton to hemp. The most detail-oriented designers may ask if their raw materials are grown with a focus on fungi, as healthy mycorrhizal networks mean fewer fertilisers, which are often polluting and non-renewable.
As fungi have been “fine-tuned over a billion years of evolution to consume”, according to Merlin Sheldrake, author of Entangled Life, they are uniquely positioned to be able to consume waste materials we’d rather didn’t exist, like oil, cigarette butts, and, of course, plastic.
The process is called bioremediation, or ‘mycoremediation’ when referring specifically to fungi. Fungi have been ‘trained’ to digest waste like polypropylene face masks and plastic gloves, while wattle and straw walls have been inoculated with oyster mushroom spores to absorb post-wildfire toxins including arsenic, asbestos, and hexavalent chromium and turn them into bio-available compounds. Oyster mushrooms are somewhat of a hero of mycoremediation, used to digest cigarette butts, plastic-based nappies, heavy metals, and even oil spills. It is hypothesised that fungi are ideal for ‘eating’ plastic in anaerobic landfill conditions, and even removing plastic from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
Growing one pound of mushrooms generates just 0.7 pounds of CO2 equivalents
The production of most nitrogen-based fertilisers, used to grow food and raw materials, accounts for up to 3% of the world’s total carbon emissions
The length of fungal networks in the top 10 centimetres of soil is more than 450 quadrillion kilometres, about half the width of our galaxy
For a designer, mycelium holds the answer to a plastic free future. Ecovative describes it as a “living, growing polymer”, and it can be moulded into all manner of shapes and finishes, much like plastic. The brand can grow sheets of mycelium four metres wide and 60 metres long in vertical farms, guiding the growth patterns to create different properties and materials. Other operations are simpler and smaller. Luxury skincare brand Wildsmith Skin, for instance, uses mycelium packaging grown on waste materials like corn and barley husks. “Essentially, you make moulds which are on trays, pour the agricultural waste in, the mycelium is added and then it grows,” says general manager Katherine Pye.
Aniela Hoitnik, CEO and founder of NEFFA and MycoTEX, started by growing mycelium into the circular shape of petri dishes and layering the patches formed to create a dress. Now NEFFA works on a larger scale. “We grow mycelium in a liquid state. Imagine a huge bioreactor with a stirrer in the middle,” she says. “We put water and nutrients like sugars and minerals in it along with tiny particles of mycelium and then over time we get a slurry. We filter out the particles and then pull it around the moulds, and a mould can be anything.” “Anything” spans from a textured plate for textiles to a custom dress form for an armour-like crop top.
A variety of manufacturing methods means a variety of outcomes. Under different conditions, mycelium can exhibit properties similar to foam, wood, cork, and leather, ticking the box for fire resistance, compostability, flexibility, and water repellency.
“The limitations are mostly related to humanity's still-emerging knowledge of fungi and what they are capable of,” says Gavin McIntyre, co-founder and CCO of Ecovative. To date, agricultural waste has been mixed with mycelium to create packaging, rafts, and door cores; mycelium cells have been engineered to become dense as they grow, creating a strong leather alternative used by Hermès; and mycelium has been grown on cellulose to create films.
Applications for fungi span apparel, footwear, beauty, accessories, packaging, and food. Mycelium coffins, suede-like fabric made from the cap of the phellinus ellipsoideus, and even guitars have been created by designers working with fungi.
Ecovative’s Grow.bio division, which allows people to buy growing material and forms, is designed to expand the applications of fungi. “The possibilities are truly endless, so we're working to build and engage a community of myco-curious people to press the boundaries of these materials, and perhaps start their own companies around applications that we haven't thought of,” McIntyre says.
Although lightweight enough for lampshades and handbags, fungi have huge capacity for strength. In Entangled Life, Sheldrake writes that “special penetrative hyphae can… exert enough force to penetrate through Mylar and Kevlar. If a hypha was as wide as a human hand, it would be able to lift an eight-tonne school bus.” As such, the mycelium from tough mushrooms such as phellinus robiniae can be combined with woody waste materials like sawdust to make bricks which can be stronger than concrete.
As shown with bricks, as well as pavilions, loungers, and architectural structures, the complex networks of mycelium not only work as a standalone material but can ‘glue’ other materials together, putting many waste products on the table as composites.
Mycelium, and fungi more broadly, tread lightly on the environment beyond just providing an alternative to plastics and a use for waste materials. The grinding process mycelium goes through uses 40% less energy and 90% less water than polystyrene pulping, and in its pure state mycelium is readily biodegradable; a material that comes from earth and returns to it as food.
Manufacturing costs can be difficult to calculate due to varying methods but an estimate of between USD 0.18 – 0.28 per metre squared has been attributed to fungi-derived leather, much less than bovine leather or plastic alternatives. And products can be grown in days on a huge scale. Ecovative can produce “3 million square feet of material every year on one acre of land”.
Like much of nature, fungi are threatened by habitat loss, loss of symbiotic hosts, pollution, climate change, and overexploitation. And currently they are not protected by the likes of the Environmental Protection Act. “If there is a message that comes from recognising funga then it is one of being less extractive and more reciprocal. We should take their example rather than just seeing them as another resource to exploit” says Bierand. However, he also notes that, “If you’ve got the option of making something out of plastic and you make it out of mycelium instead, that’s better.” There is a balance to be found in utilising fungi’s incredible properties and taking a responsible approach towards sourcing and applications.
This is something Ecovative takes into account. “We strive to work with local strains to be as responsible and reciprocal with our environment as possible. We have a Mushroom® Packaging partner in New Zealand and Australia where biosecurity is critically important to the unique ecosystems, and working with our partners, BioFab, we assisted in assessing locally sourced strains that could meet the performance requirements that have come to be expected from our products,” says McIntyre.
Just 425 of all fungal species on the planet have been evaluated for the IUCM red list
Mycelium composites have an embodied energy of 38.1 megajoules per kilogram, compared to between 62 and 108 megajoules per kilogram for plastic
Mycelium can be grown in as little as 5 days
Understanding today’s limitations of fungi is crucial, as it’s not a silver bullet. For instance, mycoremediation is difficult to scale as we pollute more quickly than fungi can process it. While scientists work on embracing the decomposing abilities of fungi, it’s vital that we slow the deluge of plastic waste and prioritise alternative materials and systems.
But those materials are not yet 100% perfect. For example, Mylo is only 50-85% bio-based, while Hoitink explains that NEFFA uses chemical dyes or PU coatings depending on desired outcomes, impacting the compostability. “We are really focusing on making it compostable, and we are relying on what the industry is doing,” she says. McIntyre echoes her thoughts, and explains that the brand is investigating alternatives like vegetable-based sealants and waxes.
We’re just on the cusp of understanding what fungi can do, so while there are boundaries to its current capabilities, designers should see that as a challenge for progress rather than a reason to turn back to plastic.
