Everbloom’s keratin-based fibre turns wool, cashmere and down waste into melt-spinnable material, but final FTC recognition as a new generic fibre category is still pending.
The US Federal Trade Commission has granted Everbloom Bio a temporary designation for Renoa, allowing the company to move toward commercial labelling while the regulator considers its application for a new generic textile-fibre classification.
The distinction is important. Everbloom announced Renoa as the first new apparel fibre classification since PLA in 2002, but the FTC’s August 27 letter assigns the temporary designation “EB001” and explicitly states that this does not indicate whether the Commission will ultimately approve the proposed generic name.
Waste proteins become fibre
Renoa is produced from keratin-rich waste streams, including discarded wool and cashmere textiles and down.
Everbloom purifies the proteins, modifies their structure and converts them into pellets that can be processed through conventional melt-spinning equipment. The resulting fibre is intended to offer softness and breathability associated with luxury animal fibres while improving consistency and industrial scalability.
The company says its Braid.AI platform models variables including temperature, moisture and molecular weight to predict softness, strength, texture and dyeability before spinning. Everbloom claims this can cut some material-development cycles from around two months to two weeks.
Labelling approval matters commercially
US textile regulations require products to disclose the generic names and weight percentages of constituent fibres. A genuinely new manufactured fibre therefore needs a recognised designation before it can be marketed transparently at scale.
The last entirely new generic fibre name added by the FTC was PLA in 2002, although subsequent approvals created subclasses such as elasterell-p.
Recycling moves beyond cotton and polyester
Renoa broadens textile-to-textile recycling beyond the industry’s dominant cotton, polyester and cellulosic pathways by targeting protein-rich waste.
For mills and brands, however, the decisive questions are now commercial: fibre price, colour consistency, spinning performance, blend behaviour, dyeability and available volume. Final FTC approval would strengthen Renoa’s regulatory position; large-scale adoption will depend on whether those manufacturing economics match its material-science promise.
