0:02

I'm Nala Aied, host of Ideas.

0:04

In this age of clickbait and online

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shouting, Ideas is a meeting ground for

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people who want to deepen their understanding

0:11

of the world. Join me

0:13

as we crack open a concept to see

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how it plays out over place and time,

0:17

and how it matters today. From

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the rise of authoritarianism to the history

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of cult movies, no idea is off

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limits. This is on the

0:27

CBC Listen app or wherever you find

0:29

your podcasts. This

0:32

is a CBC Podcast. Hi,

0:35

I'm Nora Young. This is Spark. If

0:38

you love clothes, learning about the

0:40

environmental cost of fast fashion is

0:42

a wake-up call. But

0:44

new research aims to produce

0:46

novel, more sustainable textiles using

0:48

organisms like yeast, fungus and

0:51

bacteria. And from

0:53

precious dyes that made fortunes to

0:55

bolts of cloth as currency, textiles

0:57

have long been linked to money,

0:59

power and politics. So today, in

1:01

an episode that first aired in May of 2023, the

1:04

surprising history and creative future

1:06

of Textile Tech. Textiles

1:11

are one of civilization's oldest technologies.

1:13

In fact, the root word of

1:15

textiles comes from to weave, and

1:17

it's the same root of the

1:19

word technology. So you might

1:21

think we've invented just about everything we can,

1:24

but there are all kinds of high-tech innovations

1:26

in the textile field these days. Smart

1:29

fabrics, electronic textiles, high-performance

1:31

fabric. But here's a

1:33

freaky idea. What if

1:35

you could grow your textiles? Microbes,

1:39

specifically bacteria and fungi,

1:42

as actually sort of living factories

1:45

or ways of producing materials at

1:47

a really efficient scale. I'm

1:51

the co-founder and CEO of Modern

1:53

Synthesis. We're a London-based

1:56

company crafting the next generation of materials

1:58

with biology. I

2:01

came to London to look at

2:03

how can we fundamentally rethink manufacturing

2:05

and look a little bit back

2:07

at nature and how nature has

2:09

developed materials. And so

2:11

microbial weaving came out of early

2:14

collaborations and discussions with scientists at

2:16

Imperial College London. And I

2:19

have a background in textile. And

2:21

so working with these scientists, I

2:23

learned not only the

2:25

incredible material properties of the materials

2:27

that these bacteria produce, but also

2:30

just inspired by the way that

2:32

these bacteria produce them and the possibility

2:35

for us to collaborate

2:38

with these living systems and not

2:40

only displace materials that

2:42

we have today, but actually design

2:44

and create new ways and really

2:47

build an exciting new future in terms

2:49

of performance as well as design. Okay.

2:52

So how do you actually

2:54

create something using this

2:56

particular bacteria? Yeah. So the

2:58

bacteria that we use was isolated

3:00

and sequenced from kombucha tea

3:03

by my co-founder Ben almost

3:05

a decade ago. And if you

3:07

have made kombucha tea, it

3:09

creates this scoby, so

3:11

this sort of a pelicle of material

3:13

that sits on top of the fermentation.

3:16

And so that's a by-product of these

3:18

bacteria and also yeast and other organisms

3:21

going through a fermentation process.

3:24

And what the bacteria are actually

3:26

doing in that is they're creating

3:28

these tiny, tiny fibers called nanosellulose.

3:30

And so they're converting sugar into

3:32

this tiny fiber. And so

3:35

cellulose, for example, is the building

3:38

block of the natural world. So

3:40

it's in leaves, it's cotton, it's

3:42

wood, it's a polymer that's

3:44

in almost everything that you'll find in nature.

3:47

And nanosellulose is the strongest,

3:50

finest form of that. Basically,

3:53

these bacteria convert that sugar

3:55

into these really fine streams,

3:58

fibers. And

4:00

those fibers themselves are really

4:02

strong. So they're eight times

4:04

stronger than steel and stiffer than Kevlar. So

4:07

you can imagine the performance potential there.

4:10

But even more interestingly, they

4:13

bind to themselves. So if you can imagine

4:15

like how your hair knots up on its

4:17

own, it's kind of like that,

4:19

but a lot smaller and they bind

4:22

to themselves and create

4:24

these fine webs of material

4:26

that are really strong and really lightweight.

4:30

And so what we've done in our process

4:32

is we've taken this natural abilities fiber to

4:35

create these really strong films and combined

4:37

that with a textile. So we take

4:39

a textile like a yarn, it could

4:41

be cotton or any other natural yarn,

4:44

and we form the nano

4:46

cellulose around that. So

4:48

you get a material that is

4:51

partially like a traditional textile

4:53

and partially like a film, like

4:55

a plastic film that you know today or

4:57

a lightweight nylon

5:00

transparent. It looks a lot like that,

5:02

but it's completely natural.

5:05

So you can achieve these really sort

5:07

of technical synthetic aesthetics, but

5:09

with a material that is fully cellulosic.

5:12

So it's fully natural, which

5:14

means that it could be recycled or biodegradable

5:16

naturally. So it

5:18

sounds like you're almost making a sort of a, like

5:21

a kind of scaffolding and then the bacteria

5:23

sort of fills in the blanks

5:25

in the scaffolding. Is that about right? Yeah,

5:28

exactly. So we're creating a scaffold and

5:30

then we form the material around

5:33

that. And we've come a long way since

5:35

the original shoe. So when

5:38

I was doing my MA, I grew the

5:40

upper of a shoe to demonstrate

5:42

the potential of this technology.

5:45

And that was a single piece upper.

5:47

So it was one thread of

5:50

yarn that was put into a particular

5:52

pattern that then the

5:54

bacteria grew around to form

5:56

the end material. And since then

5:58

we've come a long way at... in synthesis

6:00

where we've taken that process and

6:02

we've really looked at scalability and

6:04

how we can break that down

6:06

into different parts, utilize existing machinery

6:08

to form that material in

6:11

different ways to make not just one material

6:13

or one example like this shoe, but actually

6:15

a whole variety of materials for different applications.

6:18

I see. And where does the sugar that

6:20

the bacteria uses come from? It

6:23

can come from many sources. So

6:26

one of the great things about these

6:28

bacteria and a lot of the conversations

6:30

that we're having now in biomaterials is

6:32

feedstocks. And the

6:34

great thing about these particular type of

6:36

bacteria is they're feedstock agnostic, which means

6:39

they can use any type of sugar.

6:41

So for example, we could use waste

6:43

sugars from cider production here in the

6:46

UK. There's also

6:48

really cool technologies coming out at the

6:50

moment where you can convert agricultural

6:53

waste. So leaves

6:55

from other production and convert that actually back

6:58

into these raw sugars that we can use

7:00

in the production of the material. And

7:02

so what sorts of advantages would this offer, distinct

7:05

from weaving or knitting

7:07

a material as we now do? Yeah.

7:10

So there's different families of materials

7:12

today. Ours is, we've considered it

7:14

a nonwoven material. So other nonwoven

7:17

materials that you would know today

7:19

are like leather or vegan leather,

7:22

which is basically usually a synthetic

7:24

film added to a textile or

7:28

sort of lightweight performance applications and

7:30

materials. So by being

7:32

able to make these types of

7:34

materials through our process is

7:36

one, sort of the environmental impact. So

7:39

if you can think about efficiency

7:41

of growing a cow versus

7:44

actually just going straight from sugar

7:47

to end material, you're reducing a lot of

7:49

process steps, which means that you're taking out

7:51

all of that water use, all the land that

7:54

needs to be used to either grow those

7:57

crops like cotton or

7:59

livestock. So, you're

8:01

just reducing the amount of inputs that

8:03

you need that then reduces carbon emissions.

8:06

But also, the end material, unlike

8:08

a lot of synthetic materials, is

8:11

again fully natural, so it can

8:13

easily integrate into the Earth's natural

8:15

recycling systems, but also feed

8:17

into a lot

8:19

of burgeoning systems around cellulose recycling.

8:22

We can actually build these closed-loop

8:25

recycling systems without all the

8:27

plastics, because that's a big challenge at the moment,

8:29

is even though a lot of

8:31

the polymers you talk about sort of recycled PET

8:34

bottles or even recycled textiles,

8:36

a lot of that still gets out of

8:38

the loop and then

8:40

pollutes the environment significantly. Yeah.

8:44

I can imagine a lot of people are thinking, what

8:46

happens to the microbes afterwards? Am I

8:48

walking around in clothes covered in bacteria or

8:50

what happens in the end? I

8:53

mean, I get that question a lot.

8:56

So, there's no actual bacteria left in

8:58

the textiles. So, the bacteria are really

9:00

– we're collaborating with

9:02

them to make the material itself, but

9:04

then they're washed out at the end.

9:07

And I think this is something that we need to talk

9:09

a little bit more as a culture

9:11

in that there's many other similar

9:14

processes that we have in our day-to-day

9:16

lives today. I mean, beer is a

9:19

great example of a fermentation process that's

9:21

very similar. Bacteria

9:23

in the dirt also has live bacteria in it.

9:25

And these bacteria are really like

9:27

they're edible and you'll find them in

9:30

many food and beauty products today, actually.

9:39

You're listening to Spark from your friends

9:41

at CBC Radio. I'm

9:46

Nora Young and today on Spark

9:48

we're talking about innovations in textiles

9:50

and in particular biofabrication, using organisms

9:53

to create new kinds of fabrics

9:55

and more sustainable production. Right

9:57

now my guest is Jen Keene. She's the co-founder and founder

9:59

of Spark. and CEO of Modern

10:01

Synthesis. They're working to develop

10:03

a microcellulose textile by co-creating

10:06

with bacteria. Building

10:09

these new systems for biomanufacturing

10:11

allows us to move away

10:13

from these more harmful, but also allows us

10:15

to create new materials because we can learn

10:17

from the way that biology

10:20

produces different things and actually start to

10:22

engineer new materials that

10:25

can break down when we need them to. So

10:29

the idea here is you get a sort of cradle-to-cradle

10:32

type of idea that you're potentially

10:34

using the waste to create

10:37

the materials and then biodegrading them or in

10:39

some way returning them back

10:41

into the system like a closed loop? Exactly.

10:43

It's really designing a closed loop the

10:45

way that nature does. So you can

10:47

design an end product

10:49

from inception. So from an

10:52

organism or from a nanoscale, you can

10:54

really design the properties that you need

10:56

for the lifespan that that material needs

10:58

to have in the product

11:00

that you're designing so that it can also then

11:03

return to the loop after

11:05

it's been used. How

11:07

far can this approach go in really addressing

11:10

the environmental impact of apparel as long as

11:12

we're still tied to this kind of constant

11:14

consumption pattern of fast fashion? Like what

11:17

if we just made clothes out of cotton or wool and didn't

11:19

buy as many of them and kept them longer? I

11:22

mean, this is the universal

11:24

challenge, right? We 100% need

11:26

to use our clothes longer.

11:28

We also need to make use of

11:30

what we have. And there's a lot

11:32

that needs to happen in the short

11:34

term to just make the systems

11:36

that we have more sustainable. And

11:39

a lot of that comes down to energy

11:41

usage, optimizing the process that

11:43

we have. Where biomaterials

11:46

comes in in the long run is

11:49

actually moving away from

11:52

these existing

11:54

materials because we're going

11:57

to start needing to use that land for

11:59

food production. as well. So yes,

12:01

I mean, a universal way would

12:03

just be use less, keep it

12:05

in the system. Unfortunately, our societies

12:08

aren't really built for that at the moment. And

12:10

there's also a lot of people that

12:12

rely on these industries for their

12:15

economies and for work. And so

12:17

it's not a shift that we

12:19

can happen really overnight. And what

12:21

I'd like to see in the future is where we

12:24

can actually imbue more value into these

12:26

products. And that's where biomanufacturing

12:28

in these new biomaterials gets

12:30

really exciting. And that

12:32

you can actually be more

12:34

conscious as a designer in

12:36

building a product for its

12:38

use cases. And also moving

12:40

back to sort of local

12:43

manufacturing and really connecting with

12:45

the supply chain more will

12:47

hopefully also influence the consumption

12:49

patterns that we've developed over

12:51

the last decades. Beyond

12:54

what modern synthesis is doing, my

12:56

understanding is that synthetic biology broadly

12:59

would mean genetically modifying microorganisms to

13:01

be used in production. Are there

13:04

safety concerns associated with this or

13:06

even consumer acceptance concerns? Definitely.

13:09

I mean, our materials at

13:12

the moment are not genetically modified. So

13:14

we've done incredible work with scientists who

13:16

are pioneering in this field to do

13:19

genetic modification on these microbes

13:21

and other types. And I

13:23

think there's going to be huge advantages to that in the

13:25

future. But in the short term,

13:27

there's a lot that we can actually

13:29

do with natural organisms. So we're working

13:31

on how we can take full advantage

13:34

of the existing materials that

13:36

we have today. But in

13:38

terms of synthetic biology long term, there

13:40

are huge advantages in terms of both

13:43

sustainability and also performance that

13:45

can be built in from

13:48

a genetic level. And

13:51

of course, there's

13:53

disadvantages and there's advantages to

13:56

all new technologies. Our

13:58

approach has really been... We want to

14:00

make sure that everyone's talking about this. There should be

14:02

legislation, but there

14:05

is huge sort of gray areas. For

14:08

example, genetic engineering is actually

14:11

already used quite widespread

14:13

within the materials industry.

14:16

For example, I think almost 90% of

14:18

the world's cotton is already GMO. The

14:22

problem in this case isn't actually

14:25

the GMOs themselves. The plants, or

14:27

the cotton plants in this case, are

14:30

more efficient. They use less water. It's

14:32

actually more sustainable and more efficient to

14:34

produce the cotton that way. The

14:36

problem actually in that case is more the

14:38

human exploitation of it. This is where legislation

14:42

needs to be brought in to

14:44

make sure that these technologies are

14:47

controlled in a way that is fair

14:49

and equitable and actually we

14:52

can reap the benefits as a

14:54

whole, as a society. I think the

14:57

best way to make sure that legislation

14:59

is put in place is being

15:01

really transparent about these new developments.

15:04

But again, there are ways to control it

15:06

in terms of manufacturing by

15:09

building closed loop systems, making sure that

15:11

you're designing the organisms so that if

15:13

they were to get out, they wouldn't

15:15

cause any harm to the existing environment.

15:17

We need to be incredibly careful, but

15:19

I also see huge potential of

15:22

these technologies to do good. So

15:25

just to return to the work that Modern Synthesis is doing,

15:27

what are some of the remaining challenges in bringing

15:30

the technology that you're working on to MIRPIS? For

15:33

us, the big focus is

15:35

really on optimizing for scalability.

15:38

One of the biggest challenges

15:40

in biomaterials to this date

15:42

is conquering that scaling challenge.

15:44

And there's a few things that go into that.

15:47

One, we're trying to scale a

15:49

lot faster than previous technologies have

15:51

had. If you think

15:53

about lycra or elastane,

15:56

The stretchy material that's in a lot of our clothes

15:59

today, that had... You. Know: thirty

16:01

years. Of development to get to the

16:03

scale but it is used now to make

16:05

a real difference. Less space we need to

16:07

scale lot faster than that and so what

16:10

we're having to do is is parallel eyes

16:12

a lot. Of work to

16:14

some retrofit. Existing machinery.

16:16

As much as possible to

16:18

transform for these new manufacturing

16:21

and that borrowing from food

16:23

industry it's borrowing from textiles

16:25

industry to really create. A

16:27

new supply chain and it's

16:29

it's been. it's Rollins. I

16:31

would say for other. And

16:33

companies in this space simply because

16:36

maybe if there's availability. As

16:38

as feedstocks or availability of

16:40

infrastructure for example, with mycelium

16:43

to grow. Enough mycelium. They've had

16:45

to actually build a lot of this

16:47

manufacturing ourselves. I think we've got a

16:49

huge advantage in that I'm back turn

16:52

on us. A list has been produced

16:54

at Scale for other industries for years.

16:56

It's used in medical applications. It's used

16:58

in food so we can tap into

17:00

who not only that knowledge but also

17:03

those capacities to to scale up. Quite

17:05

quickly, it's really fascinating and I'm quite

17:07

beautiful, thanks so much for talking to

17:09

his opponents, thank you for having. Jin.

17:13

Keen is coup founder and Ceo

17:15

of Modern Synthesis, a bio fabrication

17:17

company. Based in London Uk. If you'd

17:19

like to see a picture of a

17:21

shoe prototype produced using bacteria you can

17:24

find is that our website Cbc.e A/spark.

17:33

For. This

17:35

is a super. Record

17:38

Royal. Mean we make.

17:42

Us we do. And

17:48

you're young and today on Spark We're

17:50

talking about bio design, designing and creating

17:52

textiles by working with organisms in hopes

17:55

of building. A more sustainable apparel

17:57

industry. now have you heard

17:59

using waste sugar and bacteria is

18:01

just one approach to designing textiles

18:03

with organisms. How broadly

18:05

can we borrow from biology and

18:07

natural processes to make new textiles?

18:11

The thing is, most materials are

18:13

biomaterials. Even the existing ones, cotton,

18:16

even our polyesters, it's derived from oil,

18:19

we mine it from the ground. But

18:22

the difference really with this is

18:24

actually working with biology and

18:26

working with natural systems and

18:29

living systems so that they

18:31

start to become living factories,

18:33

factories that are producing materials

18:35

for us. So

18:38

my name is Hannah Hansell. I'm an

18:41

artist and an academic and

18:43

my research really focuses on

18:45

the future of the fashion

18:47

and textile industry, particularly fabrication

18:49

and production in the context

18:51

of bio-design. I

18:54

think sometimes when you talk about synthetic biology,

18:57

it can frighten people.

18:59

It can seem quite unknown and the

19:02

potential of manipulating

19:04

life, which essentially is what

19:06

is happening. But a

19:08

lot of the techniques and processes that

19:10

are happening are not that far off

19:13

of things that we've been doing for

19:15

hundreds of years around cultivation, crossbreeding,

19:18

how we make beer, how we make kombucha. So

19:21

it's not really that far off. So

19:25

how do we get from kombucha to

19:28

a cozy sweater? What

19:30

do synthetic biology, bio-design and bio-fabrication

19:32

mean when it comes to textiles?

19:36

Bio-design is the wider term. Bio-fabrication

19:39

is more about the process, working

19:42

with living systems to produce different

19:44

kind of materials. So a lot

19:46

of the work has been focused

19:49

on working with things like mycelium

19:52

or working with different microbes

19:54

like algae and bacteria to

19:57

create naturally occurring polymers. like

20:00

cellulose, which is naturally

20:03

occurring in plants as well as animals.

20:05

Yeah. Can we dig into

20:07

the sustainability aspect a little bit more?

20:09

How can biofabrication be more sustainable

20:11

than traditional textile manufacture? Yeah,

20:15

I mean, I think the main thing is that

20:18

it offers the opportunity to really

20:20

condense the production process. So

20:23

at the moment, if you think about

20:25

something like a cotton t-shirt, you'd be

20:27

growing the cotton on the land. It

20:30

takes a lot of water use. There's

20:33

a high pesticide use within cotton. Then

20:35

it has to be picked. It has

20:37

to be separated. It has to be

20:39

cleaned before it's even then spun,

20:42

made into a material. Then it gets

20:44

shipped somewhere else to be made into

20:46

clothing and finishing

20:49

and then shipped again. So, whereas

20:52

working with some of the biofabrication processes,

20:54

because you're growing, you can do a

20:56

lot of those things all together. With

21:00

the cellulosic-based materials, you can even grow

21:02

them in vats that are shaped into

21:04

the pattern pieces if you want

21:06

to. Wow. That's very cool. That's

21:09

some of what they're doing at Modern Synthesis,

21:11

as I understand. That was something that I

21:13

did in the biogenic piece as well. I

21:16

made my own individual grow vats.

21:19

So you're not essentially making a bolt of

21:21

cloth and then cutting it. You're

21:24

growing it so that it will be the shape that it's intended to

21:27

be at the end. Yeah. In

21:29

that sense, very much using principles within

21:31

nature, because nature often

21:33

will only make what it needs within

21:36

natural biological systems. It

21:39

doesn't create waste most of the time.

21:41

Or, you know, byproducts are used

21:43

in different ways. It's very, very efficient and

21:46

economical. Or, you know, byproducts

21:48

are used in different ways. It's very,

21:50

very efficient and economical. And

21:53

so part of the promise here is that

21:55

we can create these circular closed loop systems

21:58

so that it's not only that it's more efficient in... production,

22:00

but it's more efficient in what

22:02

happens to the products after no one wants to

22:04

wear them anymore. Is that right? Yeah,

22:07

exactly. That's something that I'm also particularly

22:09

interested in and trying to work a

22:11

bit more on at the moment in

22:14

new work, the

22:16

aftercare of these materials. I

22:19

find it quite interesting that we wouldn't

22:21

necessarily wash them in a conventional way.

22:25

Not necessarily all of them. I think a lot

22:27

of the materials that have been developed in industry,

22:29

they might go through a similar cleaning

22:31

process. I mean, imagine if

22:34

you could develop a material that rather than putting

22:36

it in the washing machine, you put

22:38

it into a nutrient fat where

22:41

you could then have bacteria that mended

22:43

the fabric as well as cleaning it.

22:46

So how would that change the way that

22:48

we wash and care for our garments? Would

22:50

our wardrobes completely change? Yeah.

22:54

Can we talk a little bit more about that? Can you

22:56

paint me a picture of what clothing might

22:58

be like if this mode of production becomes

23:01

economically viable? I mean, I realize it's somewhat speculative,

23:03

but can you paint me a picture? Yeah.

23:05

I mean, I think it is really hard

23:08

to know because I think in many senses,

23:10

not much might change because

23:13

the transition to these kind

23:15

of materials in terms

23:17

of making it successful and consumers

23:20

actually getting on board, there needs

23:22

to be a process of there

23:24

being some recognizable qualities to the

23:28

materials and garments that we're making.

23:31

But then at the same time, I

23:34

think there is the possibility for things

23:36

to really shift that we don't necessarily

23:38

see our

23:41

clothing as being something that isn't

23:43

living. Imagine if you

23:45

could have a pair of jeans that

23:47

actually kind of lived and died with

23:49

you. We started

23:51

to use things like entropy in

23:54

the design process. Would we be

23:56

more connected to our garments and

23:58

less likely to throw them away

24:00

if they had more of a living life

24:02

cycle to them. So I guess

24:04

I see my ideal, I

24:08

see that future as being something

24:10

where we have potentially these new

24:12

biological processes could help to connect

24:14

us to our clothing more effectively,

24:16

emotionally and physically. We

24:24

knew further progress might be found in

24:26

something other than natural fibers for our

24:29

clothes. We said, find

24:31

something with all the good things of natural fibers

24:34

and none of the drawbacks. That's

24:36

when the test tube boys knuckle down to work.

24:41

I'm Nora Young and right now my

24:43

guest is design researcher Hannah Hansel. We're

24:45

talking about experiments in creating new types

24:47

of textiles that can be more sustainable

24:49

to produce, wear, and recycle.

24:54

Do you think our perception of what apparel can

24:57

do might change? I mean, for example, I've

25:00

seen experiments with these, maybe it

25:02

was even in your research with bioluminescent clothes

25:05

that kind of glow. Are there ways

25:07

that we might think about how apparel

25:10

behaves differently? I

25:13

hope so. Yeah, that was a

25:15

really interesting piece by Victoria Gini.

25:17

She was an RCA graduate. Yes,

25:19

I would love to see it

25:21

moving in that direction. That was

25:23

something that I was trying to

25:26

speculate in the living collection piece

25:28

that I did. The

25:31

idea behind that was a set

25:33

of underwear that was not only

25:36

created by mycelium, but then actually

25:38

had living bacteria set within it.

25:41

You would wear the underwear

25:44

and the bacteria would have been

25:46

trained to eat sweat microbes. How

25:49

we could actually have a

25:51

symbiotic relationship with bacteria potentially

25:53

in the future. But

25:56

then also the idea behind that

25:58

piece was trying to elicit. how

26:00

we would feel about that, would that be a step

26:02

too far? That we wouldn't want to

26:04

have that kind of interaction with microbes. What

26:09

about public acceptance of some of these

26:11

fabrics? How do you convince somebody to

26:13

wear something on their bodies that comes

26:15

from bacteria or fungus for example? I

26:18

think it's just all about education

26:20

and awareness because a lot of

26:22

the time, unlike that piece I was

26:24

just talking about, most of the materials are being

26:27

developed at the moment, they

26:29

don't have bacteria in them, they

26:31

are fabricated by bacteria. So

26:34

actually the material that is

26:36

being made, for example, like

26:38

the nanosellulose they're making at

26:40

Modern Synthesis, it's a cellulose.

26:44

The cell makes a cellulose and cellulose

26:46

is all around us. It's

26:48

in the plants all around us. So I

26:51

think it's about education. How

26:55

far do you think we could

26:57

go with this in terms of

26:59

sustainability? Is the problem

27:01

just the technology of manufacture or is

27:03

the problem still our addiction

27:05

to fast fashion? No,

27:08

I think it's bigger than the

27:10

technology. I think

27:12

that there's opportunities to

27:14

really question the relationships

27:17

that we have, not only

27:19

with our clothing but with the natural

27:21

world as well. It offers

27:24

an opportunity to really question the structures

27:26

and the systems that we're existing

27:28

in within production and

27:31

manufacture but economically as well.

27:34

I think we really need to think

27:36

about how we not only move towards

27:39

more regenerative production systems

27:41

but also towards more regenerative

27:43

cultures where we're

27:45

thinking more about circularity and

27:48

collaboration, stewardship

27:50

of the land and really caring

27:52

for the planet. We have to.

27:55

We're in a climate emergency. There's

27:57

no getting around that. Hello,

27:59

thank you. Thanks so much for your insights on us. Thank

28:02

you. Hannah Hansel is an

28:04

artist and an academic. Her research focuses on

28:06

the future of fashion and the textile industry,

28:08

particularly on fabrication and production in

28:11

the context of biodev design.

28:28

From the Spark Archives

28:30

2016, Alice Nasto

28:33

on developing a wetsuit inspired by

28:35

Beaver pelts. In sports

28:38

technology there's a big need for

28:40

textiles that have great insulating properties

28:42

in water but still let

28:45

you stay agile and nimble. And

28:47

there's lots of examples in nature that

28:49

are really interesting that you can emulate

28:51

to develop new technologies and interesting textiles

28:53

there. Beaver's otters, fur

28:55

seals all kind of share similar

28:58

properties. So first of all, their

29:00

fur is very dense. And

29:03

if you look at their fur under

29:05

a microscope, it has an interesting texture

29:07

that people have hypothesized helped to

29:10

keep the hairs entangled and keep the

29:12

air trapped in their pelts. Our

29:15

substance is just a hexagonal

29:17

arrangement of hairs. They're

29:19

made of rubber. This isn't necessarily

29:22

exactly what it's like in nature, but

29:24

the idea is to make

29:26

a simple model to begin to understand.

29:29

Right. So it doesn't look like you're wearing a Beaver

29:31

pelt or an otter pelt when you had

29:34

this thing on. You know,

29:36

I wouldn't put this on and

29:38

dive in water and say, ah,

29:40

it works. It's more of a

29:42

tool for understanding the mathematical model

29:44

behind how to predictively understand how

29:47

some sort of texture would work

29:49

in water. Right. This

29:51

has all already been done, but we just kind

29:53

of have to look around us and try to

29:55

figure out just how it's been done. Any

29:58

mechanism that exists in flu. fluid mechanics or

30:00

physics has probably been employed by some

30:02

creature somewhere in nature. So you just

30:04

have to look and see how they

30:07

take advantage of the physics that surrounds

30:09

them. Hi,

30:30

I'm Rachel Hampton, the host of the In case you

30:32

missed it, Slates podcast about internet culture. It's

30:34

a show for people who have

30:36

a healthy relationship with social media

30:38

made by people who really, really

30:40

don't. Twice a week, our

30:42

show's board was trending at the top of your

30:45

feeds, investigates the ghosts of

30:47

internet paths, and

30:50

generally helps you sound like the smartest person

30:52

in your group chat. What do you think that

30:54

is? You can find

30:56

us by searching ICYMI wherever you

30:59

get your podcast. That is ICYMI,

31:01

the podcast that is extremely online,

31:03

so you don't have to be.

31:06

I'm Nora Young, this time on Spark, an episode that

31:09

first aired in May 2023, all about new approaches

31:12

to textile design. While

31:15

the idea of co-producing textiles with

31:17

bacteria is cutting edge, the long

31:20

history of textiles is also a

31:22

history of technological innovation. Right

31:25

down to the word itself. If

31:29

you take it all the way back to

31:31

the Indo-European root, it comes from a root

31:33

called Tex, which means to weave. And

31:37

that is the same root

31:39

that we get the word

31:41

technology from, and weaving was

31:43

very associated with the Greek

31:46

words that are the roots

31:48

of the word technology, because

31:51

it was one of the central technologies

31:53

of ancient Greece. fabric

32:00

of civilization, how textiles made

32:02

the world. In it

32:04

she shows how textiles were so

32:06

important in societies that they made

32:08

fortunes, symbolized power and status, and

32:11

drove innovation. So

32:16

before you have cloth you have to have thread which as

32:18

you discuss in the book was very labor

32:20

intensive. In fact you write that manual spinning

32:22

was the bottleneck in production and yet we

32:24

don't even think about that process today.

32:27

So what was involved in spinning thread

32:29

and how did that process get streamlined?

32:32

What spinning does is it

32:34

makes thread long and strong.

32:36

So you're twisting fibers so

32:38

that they press against each

32:40

other in essentially

32:43

helical structure that creates

32:45

strength. When you see

32:47

somebody who is a good spinner it

32:49

looks like magic. It looks like they're

32:52

bringing something out of nothing. They have

32:54

these lightly ordered fibers and they're making

32:56

something very structured out of them. In

32:59

fact it was a metaphor for life

33:01

and creation and birth and

33:03

many different mythologies. But

33:06

it actually takes a really long

33:09

time to make enough

33:11

thread to make any

33:14

significant amount of cloth and that's just because

33:16

it takes a lot of thread to make

33:18

anything. So if you take

33:20

the cloth in a typical

33:23

pair of blue jeans, it's about

33:25

six miles or ten kilometers of

33:27

thread. And the fastest

33:29

and best spinners in the world

33:31

before the Industrial Revolution who were

33:33

in India using

33:36

a wheel called the Charka, it

33:38

would have taken them a hundred hours

33:40

to spin that much thread. So

33:43

it was this bottleneck

33:45

in production where women,

33:48

it was very much a female

33:50

job, all around the world

33:52

were spending all their time spinning. And then if

33:55

you look at a very specific place

33:57

where we have the origins of the

33:59

Industrial Revolution. you look in

34:01

Britain in the late

34:03

18th century, it's a

34:05

big textile production site

34:08

but the weavers sometimes were

34:11

idle for lack of thread or

34:13

yarn to feed their looms because

34:16

even with 20, 30

34:18

people spinning for every weaver, there

34:21

wasn't enough thread in some cases.

34:23

Yeah. Can we talk a little bit

34:25

about weaving because there's actually

34:27

this fascinating relationship between math,

34:30

computer science and the history of weaving

34:32

cloth. What can you tell me about that? Well

34:35

weaving first of all is the

34:37

original binary technology because a thread

34:40

is either up or down, you're either

34:42

going over it or under it, there

34:44

is a fundamentally binary

34:47

quality to it and

34:50

many people will tell me, did you

34:52

know that loom was the first computer

34:54

and that's not exactly right but what

34:56

they're thinking of is

34:59

the way Jean-Marie Jacquard

35:01

automated the weaving

35:03

of very complex patterns. Typically

35:06

when you're weaving, you have a bar of

35:09

some type that lifts a whole bunch of

35:11

threads at once and you

35:13

send a shuttle across

35:15

under those or over those depending on

35:17

the structure of the loom and

35:20

you get repetitive patterns. But

35:22

it's very hard to make

35:24

a picture like a bird or

35:26

a flower and in order to do

35:28

that there were very complicated looms that

35:30

required multiple people

35:33

and the people holding individual

35:35

threads. And so what Jacquard

35:37

did was he came out with a way of

35:40

automating it where you had punch

35:42

cards where depending on whether there

35:44

was a hole or not in

35:46

the punch card, a thread would

35:48

lift individually

35:51

and each punch card was one pass across

35:53

the loom. And

35:55

this inspired Charles Babbage who

35:57

was thinking about early computing. to

36:00

think about how it might work.

36:03

Now his analytical engine didn't

36:06

actually happen in the real world.

36:08

It was more of a theoretical

36:10

concept, but Ada Lovelace, who

36:12

worked with him famously, wrote that

36:15

the analytical engine would

36:17

weave algebra the way the

36:19

Jacquard loom would weave cloth.

36:22

So that was an inspiration and

36:25

those of us who are old

36:27

enough to remember the 1970s, there

36:29

was a period where punch cards

36:31

were actually what held your program.

36:34

There's also a less

36:36

well-known aspect of the

36:39

early history of computing where

36:42

the initial, whether

36:44

it was programs or data,

36:46

were stored on essentially a

36:49

woven structure of

36:51

copper wires that was called magnetic

36:53

core memory. And you had a

36:55

little magnetic donut at the

36:57

intersection. I mean, these donuts are like the

36:59

size of a pencil point, but at the intersection

37:02

of each warp and weft

37:04

in weaving terms, the

37:06

copper threads. And that wasn't

37:08

modeled on weaving. It just

37:11

fell out of the essentially

37:13

binary nature of weaving. So

37:16

there's weaving and yet today most of our

37:18

clothes are knitted, not woven. Why is

37:20

that? That is

37:22

really a new phenomenon. And there

37:25

are two, at least

37:27

two reasons. One is

37:29

simply comfort. We like these stretchy

37:31

clothes that move with us and

37:33

knitting is intrinsically

37:36

stretchier than, even

37:39

without spandex, is intrinsically

37:41

stretchier than woven cloth.

37:44

The other has to do with the setup

37:47

times because you can

37:49

change the thread much more

37:52

quickly, even on modern machines

37:54

in knitting than you can on a

37:56

loom. And that feeds

37:58

into certain techniques. technological

38:00

developments that are happening

38:02

today, most knitted

38:05

fabric like in a typical t-shirt

38:07

will actually have been knitted

38:10

in a big cylinder and

38:12

then sliced into

38:14

flat cloth and then cut and sewn

38:16

the same way more or

38:19

less that woven cloth would have.

38:21

But it is possible with modern,

38:24

a different type of knitting machine

38:27

and computer software to knit

38:29

in three dimensions and so that

38:32

you will get the whole shirt

38:34

and there will be no seams

38:36

and you can program it to

38:39

vary the pattern, change the

38:42

yarn quickly, change the colors

38:45

and so this is becoming

38:48

more commonly used. Interestingly,

38:51

the biggest take-up

38:53

aside from high-end fashion has

38:55

been in knitting sneakers because

38:58

you can program this to

39:00

knit different

39:03

stitches in different places. So you can have

39:05

the part where the laces go, can be

39:07

one kind of stitch, the arch can be

39:09

another stitch, the heel can

39:12

be another stitch depending on the

39:14

need of the shoe and then you end

39:16

up with this sort of slightly funny-shaped thing

39:18

that you just fold together and put

39:20

a sole on and you've got

39:22

this whole shoe in one piece.

39:25

And that can be

39:28

customized, it can also

39:30

allow manufacturers to make

39:32

smaller batches and make them closer

39:35

to the final customer rather than

39:37

making them in huge quantities far

39:39

away and then putting them on

39:41

container ships. The

39:45

dress of our moderny is symbolic

39:47

of a progressive textile industry producing

39:49

many kinds of fabric, fabric

39:52

like the golly's work of this evening bow.

40:00

Fabrics for volume sales to the cutting

40:03

markets. And

40:06

fabrics for the great retail markets where

40:08

they meet the critical eye of another

40:10

modern Eve who picks and chooses to

40:12

get the best quality at the lowest

40:14

price. To keep her buying

40:17

is the problem of the mill man. His

40:20

is the problem of high quality production

40:22

at lowest possible cost. Today

40:24

the textulately attacking this problem

40:27

with scientific modernization of

40:29

mill, materials and machinery.

40:39

I'm Nora Young. Today on Spark we're looking

40:41

at textile technology. Right now my

40:43

guest is Virginia Postro, author of

40:45

the Fabric of Civilization. A look

40:47

at the technology, history and cultural

40:49

impact of textiles. So

40:54

as we talked about it took a lot

40:56

of thread to make a lot of fabric.

40:58

So before the Industrial Revolution,

41:00

typical people didn't have very

41:03

many clothes or very many

41:05

bed linens or anything other kinds of

41:07

fabrics in their lives. And so if

41:10

you had wall coverings and

41:13

rugs and you change

41:15

your clothes frequently for different occasions, that

41:17

was a signifier of wealth. Another

41:19

way would be the nature

41:21

of what was woven. Velvets

41:23

are very complicated to weave. So if

41:26

you look at say Renaissance

41:28

art and you see luxurious

41:31

clothing that signifies

41:33

wealth, you'll often

41:35

see velvets. You'll see brocades which

41:38

have a pattern woven into

41:40

the cloth which requires a

41:42

drawlin which is before Jacquard was

41:44

this very very complicated process. You

41:47

might have silks which even

41:49

today when it's more efficient,

41:51

it's more expensive because it's

41:54

a laborious process raising silkworms

41:56

in very exacting

41:59

conditions. and reeling

42:01

off fibers from cocoons.

42:04

So all of those things. And then one

42:06

of my favorite ones is this

42:09

famous Tyrion purple dye, which

42:11

was the great luxurious,

42:13

very expensive marker of wealth

42:15

and eventually of royalty in

42:18

the ancient world. But in

42:20

ancient Rome, it was not

42:22

excluded. You didn't have to be an aristocrat,

42:24

but you had to have a lot of money. And

42:26

it's made from the gland

42:30

of some snails that

42:32

grow in the Mediterranean. And

42:34

it's just a horrible process.

42:38

You need a lot of snails

42:40

to make very much dye. They're

42:43

smelly. You've got

42:45

rotting snail flesh. It's

42:47

disgusting. But the other thing

42:49

that's fascinating about it is not only do

42:51

you wind up with this good purple

42:54

dye, which can be used particularly

42:56

on wool. It works really well. And that's what

42:58

the Romans used it on. But

43:00

the stench stays on the

43:02

cloth. So it's not like

43:04

something like indigo, which is the original

43:07

form of the blue in your blue

43:09

jeans, is a smelly dyeing

43:11

process. But the eventual cloth

43:13

doesn't smell. But

43:15

this smells. And even after this

43:17

clothing is done, it still smells.

43:20

Even after it's done, even after

43:22

it's washed, that is fascinating from

43:24

the standpoint of status. Because what

43:27

that does is it's a signifier

43:29

that you have the real thing,

43:32

that you don't have some

43:35

alternative. It's not sigh from

43:37

lichen. This is the

43:39

real deal. And you can tell

43:42

because it stinks. And we have

43:44

satirical poems from ancient Rome about the

43:46

way rich people's clothes melt. And

43:50

with these dyeing technologies, in some cases,

43:54

they were really the keys to

43:56

considerable wealth, like the Phoenicians and

43:58

the Tyrian purple or that. Right.

44:01

With an insect in Mexico? Cochineal?

44:04

Yes. The cochineal. Yeah, the

44:06

cochineal insect, which is

44:08

it lives on a certain

44:10

type of cactus. It's a tiny little mite.

44:14

And if you crush them, you

44:16

get a brilliant red. And

44:19

over many centuries, they were

44:21

cultivated and developed by the

44:23

indigenous people in what

44:25

is now Mexico. And they

44:27

were taxed by

44:29

the Aztecs. And, you

44:32

know, they had to turn in ridiculous

44:34

amounts of this because it's very valuable.

44:38

But you have, but again, they're very small and

44:40

so it takes a lot. And then they were

44:42

taxed by the Spanish. But

44:44

even with the taxation, the

44:46

demand was so great for

44:49

this once Europeans saw

44:51

how fabulous it was that

44:53

there was also a big commercial demand

44:55

on top of the taxes so that

44:58

you saw people. There's some

45:00

great quotes that I found where the local

45:02

grandees, indigenous grandees

45:05

in this cochineal

45:07

growing parts of Mexico were

45:09

upset by these nouveau riche

45:11

cochineal farmers who had suddenly,

45:14

you know, before there was an European

45:16

cochineal market, these people didn't wear such

45:18

fancy clothes and they didn't have so

45:20

much cacao and all of these things

45:22

and so, yes, it was

45:24

one of the great treasures of the

45:27

new world from the Europeans' point of view

45:29

was not just gold, but

45:31

was also dye sources, cochineal being

45:34

the most valuable, but other things

45:36

like Brazilwood, which is the

45:39

tree that Brazil is named

45:41

for. It was a very hardwood and then

45:43

you would grind it and it made a

45:45

sort of cheaper red dye. What

45:48

happened when synthetic dyes came along? There

45:50

was quite a revolution. Many

45:54

things happened. One is it really did

45:56

upend the production of dyes from

45:58

plants and animals. all of

46:01

those markets because it was

46:03

disruptive. You went

46:05

from having lots of indigo grown

46:07

in India to very

46:10

little demand for it. And this is in the

46:12

mid 19th century. The first synthetic

46:15

dye was invented in 1856 by

46:19

an 18-year-old chemistry student named William

46:21

Perkin. He invented a purple dye

46:23

by accident but then he developed

46:26

it into a dye

46:28

and developed, essentially developed chemical engineering in

46:30

order to produce the dye at scale

46:32

and then you got a lot of

46:34

other people doing this as a business.

46:37

It led to the modern

46:39

chemical industry because suddenly

46:42

there was a reason to hire a lot of

46:44

chemists and then once

46:46

you have synthetic dyes as a product,

46:48

then you think about what else you

46:50

could make. So for example of Bayer

46:55

Aspirin fame, they were

46:57

originally a dye house and

46:59

so the development of drugs,

47:01

the development of explosives, the

47:03

developments of glues, paints, photographic

47:06

chemicals, all kinds of things

47:08

came out of the

47:11

dyes and also it changed the

47:13

way we see the world. One

47:16

of the inspirations for my book was

47:18

seeing a purple and black

47:20

dress in the museum at the Fashion

47:22

Institute in New York that was 1860

47:25

and the colors were so much

47:28

more vivid than the colors in

47:30

the preceding part of

47:32

this exhibition which was on color and

47:34

fashion where only plant and

47:36

animal dyes had been usable.

47:39

So you got a much

47:41

bigger range of colors available.

47:44

You got lots of

47:47

greens which were very difficult

47:49

to produce before synthetic dyes

47:51

and the dyes that

47:54

had allowed vivid

47:56

greens in the 19th century

47:58

were also based on arsenic. So

48:01

in that case synthetic dyes were

48:03

safer as well as more vivid

48:06

than what had gone before. So

48:08

it really changed the way we see

48:11

the world and it changed our expectations

48:13

and it also led to this huge

48:15

industry which then in

48:17

the 20th century developed synthetic

48:19

fibers and plastics which were

48:22

developed together which then changed textiles

48:24

again. Rayon

48:35

yarns that take a merited place

48:37

beside every other important development that

48:40

has added beauty, luxury, ease

48:42

and comfort to our daily lives. There

48:45

are satin, French crepes, flat

48:48

crepes, haphazard and knitted fabrics of

48:50

every type. Rayon

48:52

marcouzettes, boy, ninans

48:55

and plain and novelty weave.

48:58

Roquette, Jackar,

49:01

Sporri, scissors, mamaskes

49:05

and plain weave. I'm

49:15

Nora Young and right now on Spark My

49:17

Guest is author, columnist and speaker Virginia

49:19

Postel. She's the author of

49:21

The Fabric of Civilization. We're talking

49:23

about the technology and cultural impact

49:25

of textiles throughout history and across

49:27

cultures. A

49:32

chunk of the book is about trade and

49:35

the role that fabric plays in fostering social

49:37

technology. So how did trade further things like

49:39

literacy and numeracy? Yeah, so

49:42

textile trade is some of the earliest

49:44

trade in the world and

49:47

in fact even things we think of as

49:50

being other things like trading

49:52

spaces. The spices

49:54

actually included dye stuff. So

49:57

trading thread, finished cloth.

50:00

partially finished cloth and

50:03

ingredients for dying cloth

50:05

is some of the earliest trade we

50:08

have. And the earliest records we

50:10

have of long-distance trade are

50:12

cuneiform tablets that are about 4,000 years

50:16

old that are from a place

50:18

called Kinesh, which was the destination, which is

50:20

in what is now Turkey, but they came

50:22

from a place called the Sur, which is

50:24

near Mosul in what is now Iraq. And

50:28

what's interesting about these tablets

50:31

compared to other cuneiform tablets in that

50:33

part of the world is

50:35

that first of all they're all about trade and primarily

50:38

textile trade. Secondly, they're written

50:40

in a simplified form of

50:42

the script that was a

50:45

product of mass literacy that

50:48

these traders and many of their wives,

50:50

who in many cases were the business

50:52

partner at the home front, were literate

50:55

so that they could exchange these letters.

50:58

And it was a simpler form of

51:00

the language than what you find in

51:02

scribal cultures where you don't have literacy.

51:04

So there's that and then if you

51:06

go way forward to

51:08

say, you know, the Italian Renaissance

51:10

period where you have a lot of trade throughout Europe,

51:13

those people are literate but also you're starting to

51:15

get things like mail service, regular

51:17

mail service, so people can send

51:19

letters around. And you also get

51:22

schools teaching, not literacy,

51:25

but arithmetic. All

51:27

of those techniques that we learned in

51:29

elementary school, someone had to invent and

51:32

they were developed in this

51:34

period as Hindu Arabic numbers

51:37

came into Europe. Previously,

51:39

people had been using Roman

51:41

numerals and abacus and now finally

51:43

they were doing pen and paper

51:46

calculations, which then leads to bookkeeping.

51:48

And this is all very much

51:51

driven by the textile trade. Yeah.

51:54

In addition to this book, you've also written books about

51:56

glamour and about style. I mean, obviously we

51:58

need clothes to protect ourselves from the elements.

52:01

But why do you think

52:03

cloth and clothing have become such a

52:05

varied and important kind of cultural

52:07

product? There is a

52:09

theory that cloth is always a

52:11

cultural product. Like its origins lie

52:13

in the need to

52:16

preserve norms of modesty, if you

52:19

will, covering the body as

52:21

the glaciers receded and furs

52:25

and leather became too

52:27

hot. After thousands and thousands

52:29

of years of wearing clothes people didn't

52:31

want to just go naked again. So

52:34

that's one theory, but obviously in

52:37

many climates you need clothes to protect you one

52:39

way or the other. But

52:41

we have dyed cloth,

52:44

6200 year old indigo dyed

52:46

striped cloth from that's been

52:48

recovered in Peru. So we

52:51

know that people were creating

52:53

complicated patterns, going to a

52:56

lot of trouble to do

52:58

more than function. We don't know whether

53:00

that was status, whether it was religious meaning,

53:02

whether they just thought it was pretty. We

53:04

don't know why they did it. We just

53:06

know that there has been this desire

53:09

from the very earliest

53:12

times to do something

53:14

more than protect

53:17

the body. And I

53:19

think that goes to very deep human

53:21

impulses. I mean, we're social creatures. We're

53:24

creatures who have an aesthetic

53:27

appreciation that seemingly made

53:29

up in our makeup

53:32

on what exactly seems beautiful to us

53:34

may vary somewhat by culture, but

53:37

that's an element. It's status,

53:39

but it's not just status.

53:41

It's also something about identity.

53:45

I'm like that. I'm like these

53:47

people. I'm not like those people.

53:49

So that's not status

53:51

in the hierarchical sense, but just status

53:53

in a sense of belonging. And

53:55

that's very much what my 2003 book, The

53:58

Substance of Style is about. It's like,

54:01

why does it matter what things

54:03

look like? Why would you pay extra

54:05

for a certain case for your phone

54:07

when you could get a generic protective

54:10

case if you're worried about that? Is

54:12

it just manipulation or is there something

54:15

deeper going on? It's

54:18

a super fascinating book. Thanks so much for talking

54:20

to us. Thank you. Virginia

54:23

Postrel is the author of The Fabric

54:25

of Civilization, How Textiles Made the World.

54:28

She's also a visiting fellow at the Smith Institute

54:30

at Chapman University. You've

54:38

been listening to Spark. The show was made by Michelle

54:40

Parisi, Sam Ruit-Johannes, Matt News, Makenna

54:42

Hadley Burke, and me, Nora Young.

54:45

And by Jen Keane, Hannah Hansel,

54:48

and Virginia Postrel. And

54:50

from the Spark archives, Alison Astow. And

54:54

from the free CBC Listen app or your

54:56

favorite podcast app, I'm Nora Young. Thank

54:58

you. For

55:12

more CBC podcasts, go

55:14

to cbc.ca/podcast.