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BIODESIGN
SUSTAINABiLITY
BIOMATERIALS
FASHION
REDRESS
REDRESS, 2025
Studio
REDRESS lives at the intersection of sustainability, fashion, and biomaterials—a studio that asks us to look closely at the systems we wear, to trace their impacts across human and natural worlds, and to create something new from that understanding. It is hands-on, experimental, and deeply conceptual.
Our work is shaped by the Biodesign Challenge, which asks us to imagine futures shaped by biology—not as metaphor, but as collaborator. BDC calls for concepts that are scientifically grounded, ethically aware, and socially and environmentally transformative.
Within that frame, my project explores lotus-leaf mechanical waterproofing: a biodegradable material that repels water through structure rather than chemistry. It is an attempt to design with nature’s logic instead of overpowering it—an inquiry into how surface geometry might shift packaging from extractive to reciprocal.
Below is the arc of that work: the problem that surfaced, the experiments that shaped the path, and the material that emerged from failing, learning, and refining.
polybags used every year
180B
polybags account for 25% of plastic bags globally
25%
of polybags are recycled
<15%
What if waterproofing could come from structure rather than chemistry?
PROBLEM STATEMENT
Fashion moves through the world wrapped in a kind of chokehold. Before a garment is ever worn, it has already passed through a chain of plastic—thin, transparent sleeves that protect it from factory to doorstep. Necessary, yes. But these polybags accumulate into an unseen tide of waste, breaking down into microplastics that drift into rivers, soil, bodies. The protection they offer the garment becomes a wound carried by the planet.
Alternatives exist, but none resolve the contradiction. Recycled plastics still fragment. Compostable films often depend on synthetic waterproofing that trades one chemical burden for another. The industry is left with a paradox: it needs materials that safeguard clothing without damaging the ecosystems those clothes ultimately depend on.
So our work began with a single question:
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The lotus leaf offered a clue. Its legendary water repellence comes not from coatings but from micro-scale geometry—tiny papillae that trap air pockets and prevent wetting. If we could biomimic this architecture in a biodegradable film, perhaps packaging could become hydrophobic through design, not petrochemistry.
This project traces that pursuit: the hypothesis that sparked it, the experiments that tested it, and the material that surfaced from trying to design with nature’s intelligence rather than in defiance of it.
Experiments
Our experiments centered on a simple premise: could we translate the lotus leaf’s microgeometry into a biodegradable film?
To test this, we gathered dried lotus leaves and captured their surface architecture by pouring silicone over them, creating flexible molds that preserved the leaf’s raised papillae and micro-ridges. We poured our bioplastic formulations into these molds, letting them cure into thin, translucent sheets textured with the leaf’s geometry. Smooth films made from the same recipe served as our controls.
Once cured, we measured water contact angles and observed how droplets behaved. Drops on the smooth films spread and softened over time; drops on the lotus-textured films beaded higher, held their shape longer, and resisted wetting.
The finding was clear:
structure alone increased hydrophobicity.
The effect was modest—not yet superhydrophobic—but clear. Proof that water resistance can be designed through geometry rather than chemistry.
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This result became our anchor, showing that biomimetic patterning can move packaging toward a cleaner, more reciprocal future.
SILICONE MOLDS
CHALLENGES
The path here wasn’t linear. This project didn’t begin with lotus leaves. As a team, we first gathered around the hope of eliminating plastic use in the post-processing of leathers and vinyls. We imagined mycelium films, living composites, and bio-grown finishes that could replace petroleum outright.
But then reality stepped in. Mycelium demanded sterile environments, long growth cycles, equipment we didn’t have, and time we absolutely did not have. We weren’t wrong; we were just out of alignment with the constraints of a ten-week studio.
The turning point came in conversation with a woman working deep inside the fashion supply chain. She told us something simple but perspective-shifting: even when materials like vinyl remain unchanged, brands are urgently seeking better packaging—places where innovation can move faster, scale sooner, and meaningfully reduce the industry’s plastic footprint.
It reframed the problem entirely. If we couldn’t transform the materials themselves right now, maybe we could transform the world they move through.
So we shifted—still chasing the same thesis of reducing fashion’s dependence on petrochemicals, but looking for another doorway.
Moving forward
Three key avenues that now anchor our work moving forward:
FIDELITY
How closely can we echo the lotus leaf’s micro-geometry? Our early molds were promising, but higher-resolution textures could unlock stronger hydrophobicity.
FORMULATION
Which bioplastic recipes can hold these microstructures without losing clarity or strength? Some films behaved beautifully; others wilted, warped, or dissolved into unintelligible jelly.
FEASIBILITY
What would it take for this to exist in the real supply chain? Casting, embossing, tooling, scalability—these became design questions rather than constraints, shaping the path forward.
VISION
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Instead, the packaging is clear, beautiful, biodegradable—made functional not by synthetic coatings, but by geometry. A material that protects the garment without harming the world it moves through.
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In this world, packaging becomes a new kind of experience: intentional, and aligned with the natural logic it’s built from—proof that even the simplest touchpoint in fashion can be redesigned toward care.
Imagine a world where unboxing a garment doesn’t mean peeling it out of a petrochemical sleeve.
