Natural Fiber Welding, a materials startup in downstate Peoria that's backed by Ralph Lauren, is opening a new facility dedicated to making plant-based leather.
The company announced this week that it is opening a new 110,000-square-foot manufacturing space on West Jefferson Avenue in downtown Peoria. The facility will be used to produce its plant-based leather product, called Mirum. Using things like hemp, waste cork, coconut and vegetable oil, NFW is able to create a product that performs like conventional leather but without any of the plastic resins, glues or coatings relied on by other plant-based leather alternatives.
The new facility will create 100 new jobs in 2021, the company said, and be able to eventually produce tens of millions of square feet of Mirum per year. The product is currently being used in the automotive and fashion industries, including in a new plant-based bag line from Bellroy.
NFW, which was one of Chicago Inno's 21 startups to watch in 2021, also makes a product called Clarus, which takes recycled cotton and turns it into new high-performance materials. NFW welds the short fibers from cotton waste into longer fibers to create high-performance cotton yarns. This allows designers to reuse the cotton to create upcycled material that outperforms synthetic fabrics while still retaining the feel of cotton.
Last year, NFW received a minority investment from the Ralph Lauren Corporation. The fashion giant said it plans to use NFW's technology to help it create clothing from natural, sustainable materials.
NFW was founded in 2015 by Luke Haverhals, who created the technology that would ultimately become NFW in 2008 as a chemist at the United States Naval Academy. With funding from the U.S. Department of Defense, Haverhals discovered the ability to manipulate natural fiber structures at near atomic precision, the company says.
The startup's materials can be used in clothes, shoes, furniture and automobiles. It currently has around 80 employees.
