How beer is used to make alternative leather

kernel Brewery in London's Burman something unusual is brewing this grain left over from beer production is commonly used for animal feed or can even end up in landfill but here it's getting a new lease of life it's going to be transformed into a leather alternative known as New grain no animals no plastic and now it's time for all of this to head

back to to are of biomaterials lab around the corner once these sacks arrive at the lab it's time for the process to begin first of all it's emptied out into a container like this and then an alkaline solution is added that's stirred for about an hour to extract the protein from the grain then the husk will be separated and the protein liquid will move along to the next stage where some natural ingredients will be added this will be stirred for another couple couple of hours and at this point protein strings start to develop and that means that it's ready to be poured into the trays now this tray here has

got a pretty smooth finish so that'll create something that looks like a lot of natural Leathers if you want something even

smoother than that well there's a tray for that too and for something that's a bit more of a crocodile look well you've even got a version like that varying the beer that the grain comes from by say using Stout will result in different final colors after the material's been sitting in the tray for a day it's ready to peel off that's so smooth that's like PVC yeah I no

we've uh it's completely shiny cuz it's unbacked and now that just needs its sustainable backing added one of the big environmental issues with leather production is actually the tanning process though and ardor is hoping for a solution we are exploring using natural coloring agents so there's actually a lot of deep tradition in old uh tanning before the Advent of petrochemicals or chromium tanning so we're exploring these old dyes that are naturally derived and work

with the environment and biod degrade and now for a look at some of the finished product we've got a whole roll of it here it looks very much like leather this one's quite soft we've got some here that have been dyed it's external companies that do that because that's not actually done here but there are different textures this is a bit harder a bit

more like a leather that maybe you'd have on a sofa now if I smell it because I know that is the Instinct with leather doesn't smell of much a bit like a new car maybe which I guess could be the smell of leather it's not quite the same but they are looking at being able to customize it to smell however somebody might want it to or of nothing possibly these

two are made from different types of beer so the color is authentic they do feel less like leather to me I think because they're harder and more more solid the more flexible ones that are used for something like a handbag feel more like leather and they've just got that movement to them on a big sheet here this could make a bag that was actually fit my

laptop that feels a lot softer it moves around more like leather does but I think the main point is there's a lot of flexibility
as to how the finish is going to end up looking and what can be done to it afterwards there's competition though there are lots of other leather Al Alternatives that are coming online and they each have different positives and negatives our

solution offers a way to scale do you think it's going to be cheaper Than Leather yes how much cheaper well currently a lot of the breweries we work with at the moment give away their grain for free so our feed stock is coming in at extremely low value some of the bigger breweries sell it it's quite low so at scale we calculate that we can undercut

leather and plastic leather and when do you think I'm going to be able to go out and buy a handbag made out of this um hopefully this time next year and it's going to be a cheap handbag we start as a small collection to certain clients and then into luxury and then slowly moving down the luxury Market into more commodity and High Street and what's
worth having if there isn't a queue or a waiting list"

at kernel Brewery in London's Burman something unusual is brewing this grain left over from beer production is commonly used for animal feed or can even end up in landfill but here it's getting a new lease of life it's going to be transformed into a leather alternative known as New grain no animals no plastic and now it's time for all of this to head

back to to are of biomaterials lab around the corner once these sacks arrive at the lab it's time for the process to begin first of all it's emptied out into a container like this and then an alkaline solution is added that's stirred for about an hour to extract the protein from the grain then the husk will be separated and the protein liquid will move along to the next
stage where some natural ingredients will be added this will be stirred for another couple couple of hours and at this

point protein strings start to develop and that means that it's ready to be poured into the trays now this tray here has
got a pretty smooth finish so that'll create something that looks like a lot of natural Leathers if you want something even
smoother than that well there's a tray for that too and for something that's a bit more of a crocodile look well you've
even got a version like that varying the beer that the grain comes from by say using Stout will result in different final

colors after the material's been sitting in the tray for a day it's ready to peel off that's so smooth that's like PVC yeah I no
we've uh it's completely shiny cuz it's unbacked and now that just needs its sustainable backing added one of the big
environmental issues with leather production is actually the tanning process though and ardor is hoping for a solution we are exploring using natural coloring agents so there's actually a lot of deep tradition in old uh tanning before the Advent of petrochemicals or chromium tanning so we're exploring these old dyes that are naturally derived and work

with the environment and biod degrade and now for a look at some of the finished product we've got a whole roll of it here it looks very much like leather this one's quite soft we've got some here that have been dyed it's external companies that do that because that's not actually done here but there are different textures this is a bit harder a bit more like a leather that maybe you'd have on a sofa now if I smell it because I know that is the Instinct with leather

doesn't smell of much a bit like a new car maybe which I guess could be the smell of leather it's not quite the same but they are looking at being able to customize it to smell however somebody might want it to or of nothing possibly these two are made from different types of beer so the color is authentic they do feel less like leather to me I think because

they're harder and more more solid the more flexible ones that are used for something like a handbag feel more like leather and they've just got that movement to them on a big sheet here this could make a bag that was actually fit my laptop that feels a lot softer it moves around more like leather does but I think the main point is there's a lot of flexibility as to how the finish is going to end up looking and what can be done to it afterwards there's competition though there

are lots of other leather Al Alternatives that are coming online and they each have different positives and negatives our solution offers a way to scale do you think it's going to be cheaper Than Leather yes how much cheaper well currently a lot of the breweries we work with at the moment give away their grain for free so our feed stock is coming in at extremely low value some of the bigger breweries sell it it's quite low so at scale we calculate that we can undercut

leather and plastic leather and when do you think I'm going to be able to go out and buy a handbag made out of this um hopefully this time next year and it's going to be a cheap handbag we start as a small collection to certain clients and then into luxury and then slowly moving down the luxury Market into more commodity and High Street and what's worth having if there isn't a queue or a waiting list"

• Kernel Brewery in London is repurposing leftover grain from beer production to create a leather alternative called New Grain.
• The process involves extracting protein from the grain through an alkaline solution, then adding natural ingredients to

develop protein strings, which are poured into trays of varying textures to create different finishes resembling natural leather.

• Different types of beer used result in varied colors of the final product, and exploration of natural coloring agents for the tanning process aims at environmental sustainability.
• The finished product closely resembles leather in appearance and texture, with options for customization including scent.
• The project aims to offer a scalable solution that could undercut both traditional leather and plastic leather in cost, with plans for commercial availability within a year, starting with luxury markets and gradually expanding to wider accessibility.