The outdoor industry loves to talk about sustainability — even as many of its products remain deeply problematic for the environment.
In general, outdoor apparel often relies on synthetic fibers made from petroleum-based plastics, like polyester and nylon. It gets even worse with rain and ski jackets, which have long relied on waterproof coatings that are toxic to both humans and the environment. In fact, somewhere between 16-35% of marine microplastic pollution comes from synthetic textiles, according to the United Nations Environment Programme.
While outdoor brands have long searched for alternatives — like merino wool or even algae — there’s another innovative fabric on the horizon, and it comes from a surprising source: seaweed. After successfully creating performance fabrics from farmed seaweed, Australian company Uluu announced a partnership this week with Norwegian brand Norrøna.
The two companies will now begin designing outdoor apparel from Uluu’s fabrics — without any plastic or toxic chemicals. If real-world testing proves viable, it could lead to a significant shift in the outdoor industry’s ability to offer environmentally friendly apparel.
Functional, Non-Toxic Apparel
Over the years, the problem of plastic apparel has led many outdoor brands to search for alternatives. That includes modern approaches to fibers like Nuyarn, a performance wool made in New Zealand that’s increasingly popular as an alternative to polyester base layers. And almost a decade ago, footwear brand VIVOBAREFOOT produced a running shoe entirely from algae.
To make the first pieces of apparel from its seaweed-based fiber, Uluu has joined forces with Norrøna, a Norwegian outdoor brand with nearly 100 years of history. The goal is simple: They want to create a product with the same performance as synthetic gear, but without shedding plastic during wear or laundering.
How is that possible? Since 2020, Uluu has been developing a proprietary fermentation process that transforms farmed seaweed into PHAs, a family of natural polymers with “plastic-like properties,” the brand said in a release. PHA stands for polyhydroxyalkanoates, which are biodegradable and non-toxic. And Uluu isn’t the first to consider them for the outdoor industry.
In 2024, The North Face announced a partnership with a U.S. Department of Energy program called BOTTLE (Bio-Optimized Technologies to keep Thermoplastics out of Landfills and the Environment). The plan was to test PHA fibers with The North Face’s existing designs, but nothing has yet come to market. So far, no PHA-based apparel product has reached “broad commercial availability,” Dr. Julia Reisser, the Brazilian co-founder of Uluu, told GearJunkie.
“To our knowledge, much of the work on PHAs for textile applications remains exploratory, led by universities and research labs,” she said.
Why Seaweed?
There are several reasons why Uluu and Norrona are so excited about seaweed as a source of performance fibers.
First off, rather than adding fossil carbon to the atmosphere, it actually absorbs CO2 as it grows. Brands could also scale up a seaweed harvest without competing for arable land or freshwater.
“It offers a pathway to decouple our materials economy from fossil fuels without creating a whole different set of environmental pressures elsewhere,” Michael Kingsbury, another Uluu co-founder, told GearJunkie.
To make the polymers, Uluu uses fermentation to convert the sugars in the seaweed into PHAs. They then use those PHAs to create yarns and knitted fabric through melt-spinning, a production process that’s common for synthetic fibers.
With the help of Norrøna, Uluu’s founders said they’re ready for the next and final step: making actual gear.
Fleeces and Jackets
According to Uluu, there are many possibilities for what they could produce using their specialized fibers. They’re especially excited about making sustainable fleeces — another outdoor gear segment that leads to a lot of environmental pollution.
“Potential applications range from base layers and fleece-like fabrics through to technical outerwear and jackets,” Reisser said. “Fleece is particularly interesting because synthetic fleece can shed microfibers that persist in the environment. Uluu fibers can also be blended with natural fibers to create different combinations of feel, moisture management, durability and performance. We’re now producing our Uluu-cotton blended fabric at pilot scale for garment prototyping and further testing.”
We GearJunkies are always stoked to try out new approaches to outdoor apparel, but we’ll have to wait at least a little bit longer. The “current ambition” of Uluu and Nois to bring a product to market by late 2027 or early 2028.
