Having to double-dye garments made of blended materials means double the waste and double the time. Modern Meadow is trying to change that.
The biofabrication company recently announced its strategic partnership with Navis TubeTex, a provider of high-technology finishing machinery, which aims to “redefine” the dyeing, finishing and coating equipment segment by integrating Modern Meadow’s Bio-Alloy technology with its Gaston Systems foam technology equipment.
Modern Meadow is utilizing Navis TubeTex’s foam technology to administer dye to fabrics, targeting blended textiles that typically require multiple dyeing stages, though the technology is fiber agnostic.
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“We believe that sustainability should be at the forefront of every industry, including textile manufacturing,” Will Motchar, president and CEO of Navis TubeTex, said. “Teaming up with Modern Meadow allows us to offer our clients cutting-edge solutions that align with their sustainability goals. Together, we can drive meaningful change and shape the future of the textile industry.”
Navis TubeTex and Modern Meadow share a commitment to sustainable and responsible manufacturing. By integrating Modern Meadow’s Bio-Alloy technology with its Gaston Systems, a proprietary system for applying a low-water foamed chemistry onto or into substrates, Navis TubeTex said it aims to “enhance the environmental profile” of the textile manufacturing process. The partnership will help manufacturers reduce their water usage, chemical waste and energy consumption.
“We are thrilled to partner with Navis TubeTex in our quest to transform the textile industry,” Catherine Roggero-Lovisi, CEO of Modern Meadow, said. “By combining our breakthrough Modern Meadow Bio-Freed powered by Bio-Alloy, our revolutionary miscible blend of plant-based protein and bio-polymer, with Navis TubeTex’s state-of-the-art equipment, we created a faster resource efficient, enhanced dyeability process. Bio-Freed will provide, especially for blended textiles, a faster and more sustainable manufacturing process using an estimated 95 percent less water, 75 percent less energy consumption and 80 percent less dyes and chemicals without compromising on quality or performance.”
Modern Meadow’s Bio-Alloy drops into the Gaston System—which is found in hundreds of mills already. The company is currently test-driving the technology with Italian denim mill Limonta and will apply those learnings to scale this innovation beyond the Gaston System.
“You have the Navis equipment [that] produces foam; we need the foam to be produced very quickly, but the fabric is passing [through] very fast,” Kashif Noor, vice president of business development, bio-materials at Modern Meadow, said. “So as soon as the foam is produced and it touches the fabric, it needs to break down very quickly so that it can penetrate the fabric, and that mechanism has been hard to achieve. But with our chemistry and Navis’ equipment, you are able to kind of create the foam and then it can break [down] when it touches the fabric, so it can dye it and penetrate it.”
Navis TubeTex and Modern Meadow are spotlighting their partnership at ITMA 2023 in Milan. In collaboration with Limonta, Navis TubeTex and Modern Meadow Bio-Freed have been nominated as one of the three finalists for the 2023 ITMA Sustainable Innovation Award, which was last awarded to Candiani in 2019 for its Re:Gen circular denim breakthrough. The other two finalists were Lee and Levi Strauss & Co.
“It’s one of the biggest textile awards,” Noor said. “I’m just really happy with being in the final three.”
