Could basket weaving hold the key to radically re-engineering fashion?
From California cotton fields to 3D woven jeans
This piece was paid for by Fibershed and originally appeared on their website. I’m sharing it with you here, because this tech is so exciting. When I visited the unpsun headquarters at the end of last year, I wasn’t sure what to expect but I left feeling like I’d seen what the future of the fashion industry could look like. This is the biggest shift we’ve seen in manufacturing in 150 years and it is super exciting.
When she was growing up in Auburn, Maine in the 1990s and 2000s, Beth Esponnette was surrounded by mountains. Her mom was a basket weaver, the remnants of old brick textile mills and shoe factories were dotted throughout the suburbs where they lived. She describes it as a childhood immersed in respect for the natural world and making things that last.
The two forces led her to a career in fashion, where she quickly discovered the industry was not what she had imagined. Clothes and shoes were no longer made in America. They were no longer designed for longevity, to be worn, re-worn, and repaired across decades. Mass production and fast fashion had diminished the value of clothing for both the business owner and consumer, resulting in massive overproduction and stunning amounts of garbage. In California alone, 1.2 million tons of textile waste are thrown out every year. In fact, between 10-40% of garments made are never even worn.
Against this cycle of overproduction and waste, Esponnette set out to build true structural change. She co-founded unspun, host to the world’s first 3D weaving technology. In doing so, she has created her own reasons to be hopeful. Unspun represents the first major change in fashion manufacturing since 3D knitting machines were invented in the 1990s. It’s a novel, precision-based manufacturing software and hardware system that has the potential to completely disrupt fashion’s centuries old take-make-waste model, and could provide a much-needed revolution in how we shop, wear, and even think about our clothes. In doing so, it could also create an economic boom, generating 4.5 million jobs globally across the supply chain.
Legislators are starting to wake up to the problem—and recognize the opportunity. In California, extended producer responsibility legislation has been passed. Now, legislators are looking for solutions to champion, expressing interest in precision manufacturing and ag tech that could streamline supply chains and making textile manufacturing more sustainable. Unspun arrives at this critical point in history. It represents a new frontier for Californian innovation beyond social media platforms, search engines and cloud based companies. “There’s a grounded generation of technologists taking on the basics,” says Rebecca Burgess, the founder of Fibershed, unspun is “transforming time honored technologies to solve the waste and energy crisis in our textile system.”
Waking Up to Waste
Esponnette – who is now in her mid-30s – communicates in an off-handed way, with a casualness that belies her intelligence and ambition. Speaking to me via Zoom, from a sustainability conference in Washington DC, she describes how her awareness of the scale of the system’s failures crystalised when she was working as a product developer for an outdoor clothing company. She had just completed an undergraduate degree in fiber science and apparel design at Cornell University.
“It was just a given that 30% of what we were making would not sell,” she recalls. “There was one meeting I was in, and the question was: what do we do with all these excess tents?” There were three options: burn them, ship them to a third world country, or trash them.
She says, “I was there to learn, and I remember thinking, ‘I don’t want to learn that.’ I want to understand why we have this problem in the first place.” From that point on, solving the inefficiencies in fashion’s production systems became her focus.
Rethinking Fashion, From the First Thread
A few years later when she learnt about 3D printing, she had an – aha! – moment. Additive manufacturing means products are created by adding to, and building up, their form, in contrast to subtractive manufacturing where products are formed by cutting away materials from larger pieces – she realised what might be possible if the technology could be applied to fashion.
A mixture of curiosity and determination took her back to school, and she started a Master of Fine Arts in Design at Stanford. In a second-year group project she convinced the other students to tackle the idea of a 3D woven garment and created her first prototypes. She describes them as hacky but good enough to get into an accelerator.
The next step was bringing on cofounders. She wanted partners who understood business and engineering. She met Walden Lam the summer after she graduated in 2015 and Kevin Martin not long after that. “We all just clicked very quickly,” she says. They journeyed through rounds of pitch competitions and fundraising, slowly evolving and developing more sophisticated prototypes. By 2018, they had secured investment. The technology was still a work-in-progress, but they had the parameters of the concept.
“Basically, we grow the product,” she explains. Every product unspun makes (at the moment their focus is chinos and jeans) is built, yarn by yarn, stitch by stitch. There are no rolls of fabric being cut into patterns and sewn together. Essentially, there are no seams.
As she explains how it works, she encourages me to visualise a long piece of yarn, a one-dimensional line. Under the current fashion system this is woven into a 2D piece of fabric that gets dyed and cut into pieces that are sewn together to make 3D garments. “What we wanted to do was skip that 2D stage,” explains Esponnette. “Yarns don’t have to be a straight line; they can also be a curved line which means you can do all sorts of crazy things with them. Like, for instance, you make a basket by weaving around and around.”
The comparison to basket weaving is a pertinent one. Basket weaving is something we associate with artisans, a craft that’s passed down between generations, that’s done by hand, often using materials harvested and grown locally. This used to be the case for textiles too. All over the world flax, wool, cotton and hemp were grown nearby, harvested and spun into yarn and woven into textiles that were highly valued. Of course, there are places where this is still the case – but for many of us – it only exists in a long-forgotten past. Our ancestral knowledge has disappeared along with the association of textiles with the land.
Rebuilding a Local Supply Chain
Globalised supply chains are largely responsible for the distance between us and where our clothes have come from, we have literally lost sight of the resources and skill embedded within each piece. So much so, that within the span of a few decades, clothes have become something we value so little, studies show we discard them within 12 months of buying them or after as few as seven wears.
If unspun is successful, their new technology could change this. Since jeans are created directly from yarn, the energy and processes required to create, sell and transport rolls of materials is eliminated. The machines can create jeans so quickly, they can be made on-demand, eliminating the guesswork required to meet minimum order quantities that won’t deliver for six months and result in mountains of unsold stock.
But most interestingly, the supply chain is significantly shorter, making traceability from raw materials, to yarn, through to end product easier to achieve. Meaning, the connection between the garment and the landscape where it was grown could once again be front and centre – highlighting the value of raw materials and the need for adequate remuneration for the farmers who grow them – especially when they are doing so in ways that protect and restore soil health, waterways and biodiversity.
A Closer Look at unspun’s Groundbreaking Weaving Technology
The unspun microfactory and design studio is on the corner of an unassuming street in Oakland, California, a short train ride over the Oakland Bay Bridge from San Francisco. It’s overcast the day I arrive to meet Esponnette and some of the team behind unspun. Next to the office where we have coffee, is a large space that houses three of their Vega weaving machines. Each one is named after an inspiring woman: Berta Frey who created the Handweavers Guild of America; Calypso a sea nymph from Greek mythology known for her weaving; and Ada Lovelace, a mathematician who wrote the first computer program inspired by mechanical textile looms.
In the context of unspun, the link to Ada Lovelace, between weaving and digital technologies feels auspicious. “Weaving is how we established digital based technologies,” says Burgess. “It is the first form of digital binary code.” Like a calling card (or a punch card) from the past to remind us how computers might lead us to solutions that – in our understanding of the world as it is – don’t feel possible. Rather than simply changing or creating online worlds, digital technology could and should be integrated in the everyday and used to solve the very physical problems of manufacturing and the over-exploitation of resources that impact the tangible aspects of our lives.
The Vega machine has come a long way from its early prototypes. Esponnette indicates to the pants she is wearing, describing them as really, really old. “These are from our first machine, and they only had 720 yarns,” she says. “To get enough coverage the yarns had to be really, really thick.” Now, 2500 yarns run through each machine.
Each Vega machine is made of three walls angled together to form a triangle. Each wall is several metres long, taller than I am and covered in large spools of thread. In the middle of the triangle, a pair of jeans is suspended in mid-air, it is in the middle of being woven. It’s flat, the way a pair of jeans looks if you pinch it on opposite sides of the waistband and flatten the legs together before folding it in half. Threads are running in different directions across the triangle, connecting the legs of the jeans to the spools. It reminds me of installations by the Japanese artist Chiharu Shiota who can fill entire rooms with lines and lines of threads running between the ceiling, walls and floor. If this is the future of manufacturing, it is beautiful.
Esponnette explains the mechanics to me, a complicated system of shuttles, controlled by a software program they created, moves between the warp and the weft, building out the fabric and transforming yarns into this seamless pair of trousers. They come off the machine almost complete. A seamstress adds the trims: belt loops, pockets, waist band, zippers and cuffs. But the hope is eventually, the machines will be able to take care of everything (except for adding metal hardware like zips and buttons).
High-Fashion Collaborations Prove unspun’s Real-World Potential
In another room they show me some collaborations they’ve done with designers including blue jeans covered in colourful butterflies designed by Collina Strada and a wide leg metallic trouser by Eckhaus Latta.
The Collina Strada collaboration was part of another arm of the business. unspun developed the technology to make custom jeans using a 3D body scan so they would fit perfectly. For now, they are made using traditional cut-and-sew and not the 3D weaving machines. They ship in 5-6 weeks. But the hope is one day, to be able to marry the two technologies.
The Eckhaus Latta collab proved the machines could work with any fiber, as long as it had the appropriate strength. The team tested different fibers like cotton and jute twine, programming the pattern to fit the designer’s vision. Each design iteration was realised within a matter of hours – making the whole process remarkably efficient.
The efficiencies are truly mind blowing. It takes just 10 minutes to weave a single pair of jeans. According to an LCA unspun commissioned at the end of 2023, a pair of cotton pants woven on one of their machines has a reduced global warming potential of 53%, reduced primary energy demand of 49% and reduced blue water consumption of 39% compared to conventionally produced denim.
All of these environmental efficiencies would be improved again, by using regenerative or Climate Beneficial cotton, especially if it was grown and spun in the United States where 12% of the world’s cotton is produced. Esponnette says they would love to use American cotton, spun in local mills but that unfortunately it is hard to come by, since “most of our cotton gets exported.”
Revitalizing Domestic Cotton with CBV™ Cotton
Over the last fifty years, the number of cotton gins and mills in California has dwindled despite the fact that in the San Joaquin Valley in central California, about a two hour drive from the unspun headquarters, up to 200,000 acres of cotton is grown annually. While the majority of Californian cotton is long staple, Pima cotton – which is used in woven textiles – the state also grows a small amount of Upland, short staple cotton suitable for the canvas and denim used in the jeans and chinos like those currently produced by unspun.
Cannon Michael’s ancestors arrived in California in the 1850s with a plan to farm the land and raise cattle. At the height of their business, they owned over a million acres across California, Nevada and Oregon. Now, 160 years later, the Bowles Farming company is still located in Los Banos on the northern side of the San Joaquin Valley where Michael is growing cotton using several different techniques. Conventional cotton makes up most of the acreage and is sold at commodity pricing and they grow a small amount of organic cotton based on a pre-planting contract with a trusted mill partner.
They are one of many farms in California that are part of a regionally focused program to produce Climate Beneficial Verified cotton in partnership with Burgess and Fibershed. The Climate Beneficial program provides cotton growers with technical assistance and a plan tailored to their farm. Techniques like multi-species cover cropping, composting, minimal tillage, reduced chemical inputs and glyphosate removal are advised based on the unique attributes of each farm. Technical experts work collaboratively to design each plan, test the soil, collect data and engage third-parties to track improvements in soil health, biodiversity and water cycles. The idea is to improve the land and the soil’s ecosystems alongside water cycles and make each farm more resilient to droughts, floods and wildfires.
“We’ve been charged with the stewardship of something that’s been around for a long time,” Michael tells me over the phone. At Bowles, they rotate cotton with cash crops like tomatoes, watermelon, and carrots that break disease cycles; in winter they plant cover crops to fix nitrogen in the soil, apply organic fertilizer; and use minimal tillage. An on-farm composting center is run in partnership with an external company, which diverts urban green waste from landfill and turns it into certified organic compost. This system builds fertility while sequestering carbon in the soil. “It’s been a huge win,” Michael says. “It fits into our rotation and solves a real climate problem.”
Biodiversity is also essential to their system. The farm takes pride in managing an adjacent wetland that’s part of the Pacific Flyway and is an ecologically unique refuge for birds. They also plant native species like elderberry and wild rose to support pollinators in riparian corridors. Grazing sheep and goats help terminate cover crops pre-planting. Integrated pest management across the farm relies on beneficial insects like ladybugs and lacewings rather than chemical sprays.
Even harvest is handled carefully. Rather than using chemical defoliants, they remove leaves from cotton using a 350-degree air machine and are trialling vinegar-based organic sprays. All their organic cotton is non-GMO, and their conventional cotton uses hybrid non-GMO seeds. They are also using AI across the farm to streamline operations, monitor data and make decision making more efficient. In a world with rapidly depleting soils and increasingly volatile weather, the future of farming should look something like this.
Due to the diminishing returns on cotton, vertical integration has become a puzzle piece in the farm’s survival. Bowles already co-owns a cotton gin with four other family farms. “It gives us a level of control most growers just don’t have,” Michael says. From there, the cotton moves to a merchant, then to mills—mostly offshore. “But the closer you are to processing, the more value you can retain.”
So, they are also exploring establishing a West Coast spinning facility. “We’ve looked at setting up our own mill — it’s about a $20 million investment,” he says. “We’ve got the land. We’d automate it. But we need a big partner, someone to lock in offtake agreements so we can make the numbers work.”
What a New Fashion Economy Could Look Like
A world where farmers are value-adding to their own yarn, is where the work of unspun and Bowles Farm collide. A potential future for the fashion industry where value in the supply chain is redistributed, excess stock is a thing of the past and the quality of each garment is improved, all the while enhancing the appreciation of the natural resources that make our clothes. Esponnette and her partners are also signing offtake agreements with designers to move the business forward – with considerable success. In 2024, they secured $32 million in Series B funding with the tech VC firm DCVC.
They have negotiated long-term contracts with everyone from the outdoor brand Decathlon to Walmart. Walmart has already piloted Vega machines in some of their chino factories complimenting their $350 billion investment in American manufacturing. Given the uncertainty American fashion businesses are facing due to President Trump’s on-again, off-again trade war with China, Walmart certainly isn’t alone in exploring a return to domestic supply chains.
Esponnette says this success means they can turn their focus back to the core of the business, which is selling Vega machines to existing factories since long term they don’t want to be producing product. The hope is to establish two manufacturing hubs, one in the U.S. and the other Europe – likely in Portugal where the government is incentivising small-scale production facilities that embrace sustainable energy sources and reduce waste. At the moment unspun has six machines, next year this will increase ten-fold, to sixty. “We’re very much in the let’s get machines out into the world phase,” says Esponnette.
Whether sewn by hand or woven by machine, every piece of clothing begins with raw material, preferably one that is grown in nature. As the world changes rapidly, with new technological advancements, we have an opportunity to restructure fashion’s supply chains not just through traceability or tech, but through a cultural shift in how we respect land, labour, and creativity. If companies like unspun and farms like Bowles represent the future, they won’t just change how fashion is made, they’ll change how we calculate its worth.