Even better than silk purse from a sow’s ear

Cotton comes from cotton balls. Wool comes from sheep. (Baa…) Leather comes from cattle/cows, mostly. But also from horses, alligators, and – as we have recently learned, thanks to Manafort Trial One – ostrich. And silk, well, that comes from silk worms.

But it also comes from spiders, and spider silk, as a fabric, is something of a miracle: stronger than steel, tougher than Kevlar. It’s “extremely soft and strong, and it could make long-lasting, lightweight and desirable clothes.”

Because of its marvelous properties, and because natural born spider silk would be sort of difficult to cultivate and harvest, scientists have been trying for years to develop artificial spider silk.

Welcome to the world of biomaterials, where entrepreneurs with Ph.D.s in chemistry can order up DNA, grow yeast in small containers, and create lab-made versions of proteins in nature, such as the dragline silk of a giant spider known technically as argiope bruehnicci. One advantage of the lab-grown silk is that it can theoretically be altered into whatever consumers might need it to be—strong and soft and stretchy. While other spider-silk researchers have focused on military and medical applications, Bolt Threads is looking to use the material to make better clothing. The global fashion industry, at roughly $2.5 trillion, is giant and terrible for the environment: Low-cost synthetic fibers like polyester are polluting the oceans, and even natural fabrics like cotton require large tracts of land and chemicals to produce. Spider silk, by contrast, as a bio-material, is sustainable.(Source: Forbes)

Over the years, there have been a couple of products that use some sort of artificial spider silk. North Face had a parka; Adidas had a shoe. Bolt is hoping to be the company that makes the fabric that enables the commercial breakthrough.

So far, not much has come of their work.

…since its launch nine years ago [Bolt] has produced and sold just a tiny number of ties and hats from its lab-grown spider silk, which it calls Microsilk.

But they’re expecting to do $10M in business this year, mostly to an entity they acquired that makes sweaters and canvas bags. And they also sold a few of their ties (50 produced and sold for $314); and a few of those hats, a hybrid of spider silk and wool, that they produced in limited addition (100) and sold (and sold out) for $198. Cute enough:

Next year they’re looking to really begin making it. Which will be good news for the investors who’ve ploughed $213M into Bolt. So far, in addition to a few ties and sweaters, this has produced a valuation of over $700M. Not yet a unicorn, but perhaps on its way.

In the early days, they [the Bolt founders/scientists] studied actual spiders, seeking to understand their genomics and the material properties of their different types of silk. For a time, they had an office full of giant golden orb weaver spiders spinning webs off hula hoops they’d bought in San Francisco’s Mission District one afternoon. But from the beginning, they knew they’d need to come up with a lab-based process of creating spider silk. Unlike silkworms, spiders can’t be farmed, because they are territorial and cannibalistic.

Golden orb weaver spiders. Hula hoops. Cannibalistic.

Man, sometimes I really and truly envy scientists…

When the company was in its early stages, they:

…contacted Lillian Whipple, an elderly weaver known for working with special threads, and asked her to make something out of Bolt Threads’ spider silk. She wove a small swatch. Later, she created miniature kimonos of silkworm silk, little pieces of art the company now displays, framed, in its office in homage to that history.

Elderly weaver. Miniature kimonos.

Man, sometimes I really and truly envy scientists…

There have been setbacks along the way. One version they came up with “looked like a sick animal.” (Huh?) They had another trial that, like the Wicked Witch, melted. Another “shrank by roughly 40%.”

Which reminds me of a story my mother told.

During WWII, synthetic fibers came into use, and my mother bought a rayon (I think) dress. Caught in a sudden summer shower, her dress shrunk a few inches from knee-length to well above. Good thing my mother had great legs, but I think her garter belt was showing. Unless this was one of the days when she’d gone stocking-less and had drawn a “seam” up the back of her legs using an eyebrow pencil, which is what gals did back in the day when stockings were a) seamed; b) scarce. There was a war on!

Bolt has a lot of famous names floating around it. Peter Thiel is one of the company’s investors. Patagonia wants to work with them, if they can scale up their operations. Stella McCartney has designed some one-offs using Bolt spider silk and is planning on using it in next year’s line.

Bolt is also working on a faux leather made out of mushrooms.

Man, sometimes I really and truly envy scientists…

Go, Bolt Threads!