Ganni and Rubi debut carbon-made yarn

Danish fashion brand Ganni and California start-up Rubi, which is pioneering carbon-negative cellulosic textiles, debut the first-ever yarn made directly from carbon emissions through a fully enzymatic process.

The yarn, which is carbon-made and water and land neutral, was unveiled at the Global Fashion Summit in Copenhagen, and marks phase two of the strategic pilot partnership between both brands, where the ambition is to create garments from Rubi-made CO2 fabric.

Ganni will be the first-ever fashion brand to trial the fabrics made with Rubi’s patent-pending technology, through a blend composition of 20 percent Rubi cellulose yarn and standard industry cellulose. The yarn samples have been derived from carbon sequestration, a process inspired by photosynthesis and how trees breathe in CO2.

Neeka Mashouf, chief executive and co-founder of Rubi Labs, said in a statement: “We created Rubi to ensure our planetary future by restoring Earth’s ecological balance with reimagined supply chains that are symbiotic with the planet – starting with fashion, which is the third most CO2-polluting supply chain on the planet. When thinking about who we wanted to team up with to make the first-ever materials using our technology, Ganni was the obvious choice.

“Ganni has been instrumental in helping us to bridge the relationship between brands and manufacturing partners in order to build a future where entire manufacturing plants can truly be reinvented, starting with our upstream carbon-negative textile technology. Their commitment to a planet-positive future perfectly aligns with our mission and we couldn’t be more excited to partner with them to help bring our product to life.”

Rubi's pioneering carbon-negative cellulosic textiles starts pilot with Ganni

The collaboration is part of Ganni’s ‘Fabrics of the Future’ initiative, an ambitious in-house programme dedicated to researching and developing innovative materials that will help inform the transition towards a more circular and lower-impact fashion industry while investing in start-up fabric innovations through product offtake agreements.

Nicolaj Reffstrup, founder at Ganni, added: “We are excited to be working with Rubi on this exciting fabric development. The ultimate goal has always been to be able to create a truly climate-neutral product. With Leila and Neeka’s technology-driven by carbon sequestration - literally subtracting carbon from the atmosphere and making a material out of that - we are one step closer to that goal.

“Fabric innovations, like Rubi, will play a crucial role in getting fashion to the point of decarbonisation, but for this to happen brands need to place bets, take risks and invest in innovations. There are still a lot of things we don’t know the answer to, but working with innovative partners like Rubi gives a lot of optimism for what the future could look like.”

Rubi uses biochemical processes powered by enzymes at an industrial scale to “eat” carbon emissions and make carbon-derived, resource-neutral textiles. Its patent-pending, cell-free biocatalysis process captures and converts CO2 from the waste streams of manufacturing facilities into cellulose. The converted cellulose is then used to create lyocell yarn which can be used for clothing and materials, while 100 percent of CO2 inputted to the end product is done with zero waste.