adidas has just unveiled the world’s first performance shoe made using Biosteel® fiber – a replication of natural silk – at the Biofabricate Conference in New York.
The adidas Futurecraft Biofabric prototype shoe features an upper made from 100% Biosteel® fiber, a nature-based and completely biodegradable high-performance fiber, developed by the German biotech company AMSilk. The material offers a unique combination of properties that are crucial in performance, such as being 15% lighter in weight than conventional synthetic fibers as well as having the potential to be the strongest fully natural material available.
In addition, Biosteel® fiber also provides a far more sustainable offering, with it being 100% biodegradable in a fully natural process. This continues adidas’ journey of sustainable innovation – from a starting point of virgin plastics, to recycled plastics, to its partnership with Parley for the Oceans and now a totally new frontier of investing in solutions that leverage science and nature as an integral part of innovation.
No word on if these shoes will hit the streets for mass distribution and if they do what the price point will be, but good on you adidas for trying innovative new things!
