Piñatex

This lightweight leather lookalike is made from pineapple leaf fibres, the waste product of the 700,000 tonnes of pineapples produced by farming communities in the Philippines every year. This non-woven fabric was developed by Carmen Hijosa, a former leather expert who set out to develop a more sustainable alternative to leather and vinyl, inspired by traditional Filipino plant fibre clothing such as the barong tagalog.

This material is made by combining waste pineapple fibres with polylactic acid (PLA) fibres and a petrol-based resin coating to make a water-resistant, soft, flexible and convincingly leather-like textile. Its current uses are as varied as high-end, vegan biker jackets (as seen on the BBC’s The Secret Story of Stuff: Materials of the Modern Age), trainers and car upholstery. This material is not currently biodegradable, but that’s a future goal for the company.