Designer Stella McCartney’s Spring 2022 fashion show happened under the Brutalist concrete cover of the Espace Niemeyer. It turns out, writes the New York Times, that the space resembles a Martian bio-dome. Mushrooms are Stella’s muse for not only her spring 2022 collection, but in her deeply-held commitment to sustainability and living with constant reverence for our biosphere.

The Times’ Vanessa Friedman is not entirely fair — or her memory failed her — when she wrote that sustainability finally made its full-throated entrance in the spring 2022 shows with Stella McCartney’s collection.

Friedman wrote: “Well, hello sustainability. Wondering when you’d show up.” The fashion industry expert must have slept through Gabriela Hearst’ Chloé show: Gabriela Hearst Takes Chloé to Bugatti Speed in Redefining Purpose for Luxury Brands

Within this creative atmosphere, the fashion crowd heard the voice of American mycologist and entrepreneur Paul Stamets, who is considered an intellectual and industry leader in everything associated with fungi. In only a few seconds, Stamets summed up the future of fashion with his admonition: “In fashion, mushrooms are the future.”

Stella McCartney has been deeply committed to Bolt’Threads’ mycelium leather called Mylo, for the last few years and she shared her first Mylo production — a treasure trove of only 100 little black leather crescent handbags.

Sixty-three percent of the materials in the spring 2022 collection are eco-friendly, according to Stella McCartney’s press kit. Gabriela Hearst earlier published the stat of 58 percent of Chloé made from lower-impact materials, compared to 40 percent of the winter collection.

AOC’s point is not to pit the two brands against each other in any way, but to celebrate them for their high goddess perches of working diligently to protect the environment. It would be great for all luxury brands to issue their scorecard on sustainability in the collection as part of their press kits.

We’re not talking how many trees were planted by the brand, but the garments themselves: what styles support our global, ecological biosystem?

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Stella McCartney’s spring 2022 silhouettes were roomy as well as skinny and curve hugging. The influence of athleisure infused the collection with swagger and modern confidence. Mushrooms appeared in prints. Of great import to McCartney was the philosophy behind her designs:

“For me, the concept was about transitioning. I wanted to project what the future could be like for the house of Stella — a lightness of touch and a slightly more tender approach, but still mixing sporty and masculine pieces. I was asking myself, ‘What’s the breath of fresh air that I feel, and what are we looking toward in the fashion industry?'” the designer said.

Stella was highly impacted by the Netflix documentary ‘Fantastic Fungi’, and it’s still showing on Netflix. AOC was been following the topic of mushrooms for several years — including Stella’s work with Bolt Thread’s innovative mycelium leather Mylo™️.

Anticipating that you might become confused about more than one documentary about mushrooms on Netflix, we’ve included two for you and we will be watching both. Stella’s source of information is above, and it debuted earlier than the second one below. There may be more Netflix content on mushrooms, because AOC has just discovered at least three TED Talks.

I’ve been looking for a deep dive that touches many intellectual and planet-friendly pulse points. Stella sold me with her spring collection. Mushrooms it will be.

AOC closes out our mushroom world discussion with the video of Stella McCartney’s Summer 2022 show. The impromptu photography of spring designs from the show is worth the visit to Stella’s website.

It’s important to underscore that in addition to Stella’s commitment to mycelium, her collection also featured ‘forest-friendly’ viscose, which is sourced from sustainably-managed ancient forests. Originally considered to be good for the environment, demand for viscose became a probable driver of illegal deforestation, while felling 150 million trees each year.

In addition, viscose [or rayon] is made from plants but uses a chemically-intensive process to become a wearable fabric. These are the key reasons why Stella McCartney is using ‘forest-friendly’ viscose that is fully transparent in its transformation from tree harvest to fabric.

Cupro, a byproduct of cotton harvest and is technically a recycled and cruelty-free alternative to silk. If you didn’t know that silk is a no-no among vegans, neither did AOC. McCartney has used silk but confesses her ambivalence about how silk worms are treated.

As a result, Stella has worked to use Peace Silk, a process that doesn’t harm the silkworms, who emerge from their cocoons as moths and fly away. The silk is then gathered in the forest. It’s a lovely story, but Stella admits that she continues to experience production challenges with the Peace Silk.

Doing some research, AOC learns that Stella has worked to develop Bolt Microsilk™ yarn. On her website, Stella calls it ‘synthetic spider silk’ and she believes this new fabric will be the future of her silk collection clothes.

In summation, Stella MCCartney is setting a very high bar and enduring commitment to solving the challenges of sustainable, earth-friendly fashion fabrics production. Her perseverance inspires beyond comprehension.

As for blue mushrooms, they do exist in nature, and for now we don’t have the mental wits to explain blue mushrooms to you. An explanation IS forthcoming. ~ Anne