A week ago, Yerba Madre, the organic drink brand formerly known as Guayakí, presented with a sly flourish a pair of Dirt shoes that resembled little more than cracked, molded pieces of muck masquerading as textured clogs.
This was no accident. Designed with New York creative studio Basura, the soil-clad kicks were engineered to break apart as they were worn, scattering wildflower seeds with every step as they returned to the ground from whence they came. “Fully natural and biodegradable” was how Yerba Madre described the footwear, down to the Acacia gum that prevented it from disintegrating the second a foot was inserted. Make no mistake, however, these were shoes that were made to be unmade.
“We got questions like, ‘Why do this?’” said Emily Kortlang, chief marketing officer at Yerba Madre. “It made people scratch their heads. To me, that’s a good thing—because in a way, it mirrors our regeneration message. You have to stop, get curious, dig in. Otherwise, it’s misunderstood. The shoes might seem silly or unnecessary on the surface, but they’re serious in what they represent to Mother Earth and the work we’re doing with the communities who steward it
What these companies are designing for, instead, is a “worst-case scenario,” said Vicki von Holzhausen, founder of von Holzhausen, an L.A.-headquartered material innovation firm that makes a high-performance—and biodegradable—plastic alternative known as Liquidplant using sugar, castor and linseed oils and “some little special ingredients.” If, at the end of a long and adventure-filled life, the shoes wind up in the landfill—as is the case with hundreds of millions of high and low-tops every year, many within the first 12 months of their use—they’ll become feasts for microbes, taking a matter of months or, at most, a few years, to disappear versus potentially never.
This was no accident. Designed with New York creative studio Basura, the soil-clad kicks were engineered to break apart as they were worn, scattering wildflower seeds with every step as they returned to the ground from whence they came. “Fully natural and biodegradable” was how Yerba Madre described the footwear, down to the Acacia gum that prevented it from disintegrating the second a foot was inserted. Make no mistake, however, these were shoes that were made to be unmade.
“We got questions like, ‘Why do this?’” said Emily Kortlang, chief marketing officer at Yerba Madre. “It made people scratch their heads. To me, that’s a good thing—because in a way, it mirrors our regeneration message. You have to stop, get curious, dig in. Otherwise, it’s misunderstood. The shoes might seem silly or unnecessary on the surface, but they’re serious in what they represent to Mother Earth and the work we’re doing with the communities who steward it
What these companies are designing for, instead, is a “worst-case scenario,” said Vicki von Holzhausen, founder of von Holzhausen, an L.A.-headquartered material innovation firm that makes a high-performance—and biodegradable—plastic alternative known as Liquidplant using sugar, castor and linseed oils and “some little special ingredients.” If, at the end of a long and adventure-filled life, the shoes wind up in the landfill—as is the case with hundreds of millions of high and low-tops every year, many within the first 12 months of their use—they’ll become feasts for microbes, taking a matter of months or, at most, a few years, to disappear versus potentially never....
It’s why von Holzhausen’s 3D-printed Ripple shoe, unveiled last month, is being framed as a “case study” that showcases the versatility of Liquidplant—“the top is a little more flexible and the lower part is squisher,” von Holzhausen said—rather than something you can run out and buy, even though it could conceivably be scaled through injection molding or the supercritical foaming process that Crocs employs.
...
von Holzhausen said that what makes Liquidplant so special is that it’s “within the scope” of the cost of a petroleum equivalent while providing the same performance level.
“We’re in line with some of the high-performance polyurethanes that are used for casting in the shoe industry,” she said. “So it’s really not some exotic polymer that nobody can afford. We really want this to be a mass-adopted material, and that was part of the formula. Like, we changed our formula in order to tune it for cost.”
Link to the full article
It’s why von Holzhausen’s 3D-printed Ripple shoe, unveiled last month, is being framed as a “case study” that showcases the versatility of Liquidplant—“the top is a little more flexible and the lower part is squisher,” von Holzhausen said—rather than something you can run out and buy, even though it could conceivably be scaled through injection molding or the supercritical foaming process that Crocs employs.
...
von Holzhausen said that what makes Liquidplant so special is that it’s “within the scope” of the cost of a petroleum equivalent while providing the same performance level.
“We’re in line with some of the high-performance polyurethanes that are used for casting in the shoe industry,” she said. “So it’s really not some exotic polymer that nobody can afford. We really want this to be a mass-adopted material, and that was part of the formula. Like, we changed our formula in order to tune it for cost.”
Link to the full article