Regenerative leather turns heads
A leather producer that aims “to go beyond sustainability” ended 2022 on a high at a special event in London.
Fish-leather start-up Inversa Leathers made good ground in 2022. The Florida-based company launched in 2020 as a response from scuba-diving enthusiasts Aarav Chavda and Roland Salatino to damage that an invasive species of fish was causing to aquatic environments. The first fish they focused on was the lionfish (Pterois), which is native to the Pacific and Indian oceans and is part of the food chain there, but more recently found its way into the Atlantic and Mediterranean, where it has fewer natural predators. According to the Inversa founders, a single invasive lionfish can eat 70,000 native fish in reef ecosystems. Normally, these thousands of native fish would feed on algae growing on the reefs but, in their absence, reefs are becoming overgrown and, in some cases, dying off.
Inversa has made it clear that it does not argue for the elimination of lionfish from their native environments, but it is determined to make a contribution towards removing them from places where they are invasive. Removing the fish from places such as the Atlantic coast of the US and the Gulf of Mexico costs money; Inversa has worked out that using the skins of the lionfish to make leather can help fund this conservation activity. So much so that the company uses the word ‘regenerative’ to describe the activity of removing the fish. It also describes the materials that Inversa is able to offer finished product manufacturers as regenerative leather because its work is helping to protect biodiversity and to build back the ecosystems that the invasive lionfish have damaged.
Leather-making technique
Removing the fish allows damaged coral reef ecosystems to regenerate themselves. “In this way, we are moving beyond sustainability,” co-founder Aarav Chavda has said. An important part of this is that coral reefs in the western Atlantic support the livelihoods of more than 40 million people, according to the company’s calculations.
It found a US-based partner tannery, which it has not named, and worked with it to formulate its own technique for turning the fish-skins into leather and launched the company. It has also said little about the tanning process but has said it is preparing to move from chrome to a tanning system based on the mineral zeolite.
Raw material diversity
Achievements in 2022 included being named as one of the finalists in the Global Ocean Resilience Innovation Challenge (ORIC), which was led by non-profit group the Ocean Risk and Resilience Action Alliance. Later, Aarav Chavda and Roland Salatino won inclusion in the Forbes ‘30 Under 30’ list in manufacturing and industry, and the start-up secured new funding of $500,000 from sustainability-focused venture capital firm Conservation International Ventures. There were customer successes with Italian sneaker brand P448, which used colourful lionfish leather on the heel-tabs of one of its new styles, and Manhattan-based accessories brand Oleada, which used the leather in a new laptop sleeve design.
Also in the course of last year, Inversa began using two new types of raw material. In each case it chose material that is completely in keeping with its quest to protect eco-systems from invasive species. It is making leather from the estimated tens of thousands of invasive pythons that have descended upon and devastated the Everglades National Park in Florida. The park supports a wide range of economic activities with a combined value of $1.3 billion per year, Inversa has said, adding that this is under threat because the pythons are “feasting on endangered species” that are native to the environment. It is also making leather from the skins of invasive dragonfin (Polypterus) fish. These invasive fish escaped from ponds into the Mississippi River during flooding and are wreaking havoc among more than 150 native species.
London calling
Towards the end of 2022, an Idaho-based accessories brand, Teton Leather Company, showcased a dragonfin leather collection. It comprised dragonfin versions of its Bora handbag, along with a clutch bag and a bifold wallet.
In something of a breakthrough for the Teton Leather Company and for Inversa, this collection went on display at a special event in London just before Christmas. Lone Design Club, a London-based initiative, aims to bring independent, ethical fashion brands to “conscious shoppers” at events and in temporary pop-ups. For the Christmas shopping season just gone, it created a pop-up store at one of London’s most famous fashion addresses, Jermyn Street, and used it for an event it called ‘Season of Wonder’, which it described as a showcase for an array of products from independent and sustainability-conscious brands.
For designer and founder of the Teton Leather Company, Francesca Ritchie, the ‘Season of Wonder’ experience meant international acknowledgement of the work her company and Inversa have been able to do together. “We have broken through so many barriers to turn invasive dragonfin into a tangible piece of good for the earth,” she says, “something that our clients can be proud to own. Restoring the planet is a shared responsibility and it’s really a privilege to trailblaze these efforts with partners like Inversa and Lone Design Club at such an incredible location.”
The Teton Leather Company’s Bora bag in dragonfin leather.
Credits: Teton Leather Company/Inversa
