Step into a material lab or design studio in 2025 and you’ll feel it immediately: a sense of possibility. Jackets crafted from mushrooms, sneakers spun from pineapple leaves, denim reborn from waste cotton…what once sounded like science fiction is now a tangible reality. Today’s material innovators are challenging the status quo, urging the industry to confront its dependence on non-renewable, environmentally harmful resources, while championing a future where sustainability and design truly walk hand in hand.

The question is no longer if fashion can rethink its materials, but how the industry can scale these innovations from prototypes to the everyday fabric of our wardrobes.

A New Materials World – and Its Setbacks

Next-gen materials like Mylo (mushroom fiber that mimics leather), Piñatex (pineapple fiber that mimics leather), Circulose (recycled cellulose fiber that mimics cotton), and Bylon (biobased fiber that mimics nylon/polyester) are rewriting fashion’s playbook, bringing sustainability to the heart of product development. Yet despite the buzz, these breakthrough materials represent only a fraction of the global textile market.

A recent BCG report, Scaling Next-Gen Materials in Fashion, highlights both the progress and the challenge ahead: though next-gen textiles could make up 8% of the global fiber market by 2030, today they barely make up 1%. While promising, that growth still falls short as regulatory pressures mount, climate-related supply chain disruptions intensify, and consumer expectations shift. For forward-looking brands, the business case is clear: strategic adoption of next-gen materials could reduce cost of goods sold (COGS) by an estimated 4% over five years compared to inaction. In other words, scaling innovation is the next frontier for resilience and competitive edge.

But barriers to commercial adoption remain high. Costs are high, supply is limited, and high minimum order quantities (MOQs) keep many brands on the sidelines. Suppliers need reliable demand and consistent investment to ramp up production, but few brands can guarantee that kind of security on their own – especially when the value and impact of new materials is still being measured. The demand for robust, shared Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) data adds another challenge. Everyone from designers to policymakers needs LCA data to prove sustainability and viability, and without industry partnership, generating and verifying sustainability claims is slow and costly, limiting transparency and slowing progress.

The Missing Ingredient: Collaboration Before Competition

This urgency was echoed in a thoughtful and illuminating conversation with industry leaders and sustainability educators at the recent Good Talks event co-hosted by the CFDA and Theory. Surrounded by voices that have seen both the stumbling blocks and breakthroughs of material innovation, the solution was clear: if fashion wants to mainstream next-gen textiles and lower the barriers to entry, it is time to embrace collaboration over competition. By joining forces, brands can meet minimum order volumes, unlock supplier scale, cut costs, spread risk, and catalyze investment in new opportunities for impact that no single player could create alone.

Collaboration also makes reliable LCA data more accessible. When brands invest in science-backed assessments together, the burden of developing, testing, and verifying new materials doesn’t fall on just one player. Instead, the power of collective action paves the way, making it possible to go further, faster.

The Power of Partnership

Fashion has always been about collaboration and connection – between designers and makers, mentors and students, brands and communities. The path to better materials is no different. When brands embrace radical openness at the development stage and pool their buying power, knowledge, and accountability, a new standard for sustainable innovation can emerge – one that builds a stronger foundation for everyone.

Innovators like Uyen Tran, founder of TômTex and CFDA Design Scholar K11 Innovation Awardee, demonstrate how early investment and collaboration can accelerate innovation from lab to market with real-world impact. Industry gatherings such as the Future Fabrics Expo provide a platform for showcasing next-gen materials and facilitate the exchange of knowledge and community building, allowing industry players to connect, learn, and gain access to commercially available material innovations.

The payoff is clear: more affordable and available sustainable textiles, more resilient suppliers and supply chains, and more reliable data to meet climate goals and regulatory demands. The truth is, no single brand can shape the future of materials alone. But when the industry moves together, what once seemed impossible becomes attainable, turning next-gen material innovation into everyday reality and giving fashion the power to build a more sustainable world – now and for generations to come.

Sources:

https://www.bcg.com/publications/2025/scaling-next-gen-materials-in-fashion

https://fashion.sustainability-directory.com/area/pre-competitive-collaboration/