What if we could brew colour?
Yeast has long been used to produce bread, beer and wine. Through synthetic biology, it can also be engineered to produce valuable compounds.
Novya Biotech reprogrammes yeast to produce natural colourants. These can be used to dye textiles and other materials. This approach offers an alternative to petrochemical dye synthesis and resource-intensive plant extraction.
Dyeing textiles with colourants from yeast
At Dutch Design Week 2026, Novya Biotech presents a series of scarves and materials dyed with a purple-blue colour produced through yeast fermentation. The collection explores the application of this colour across four different substrates: cotton, merino wool, bacterial cellulose, and polyamide.
Grown by bacteria, coloured by yeast
Alongside scarves, Novya Biotech also presents bacterial cellulose swatches dyed with yeast colourants. The material is grown in a liquid culture by a symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast. Subsequently, it is dyed with the colour produced by Novya Biotech's engineered yeast.
