The Power of Mycelium: Nature’s Sustainable Wonder
Why does Milli use mycelium?
Let’s start with the basics—what exactly is mycelium? An easy way to think of it is as the root structure of a mushroom, though technically, mycelium is the main organism, and mushrooms are just its reproductive structures. Mycelium is a network of fungal cells called hyphae, which grow in long, interconnected filaments underground, occasionally sprouting mushrooms above the surface. In short, it’s nature’s unsung hero: a mass of fungus quietly working its magic beneath our feet.
My personal journey with mycelium began during an experimental design studio in my master’s program. By then, I knew I wanted to work with carbon-negative materials, but I didn’t yet know how or with what. Enter mycelium—something I knew nothing about at the time. As our instructor shared her knowledge of cultivating and processing mycelium, I was instantly hooked. It was the perfect fusion of my two worlds—life science and architecture—and it answered my burning question: how can I build a career around carbon negativity?
The more I learned, the more fascinated I became. Fungi are nature’s ultimate recyclers. Every living organism, plant or animal, eventually gets broken down and returned to the earth, thanks to fungi. In forests, they form complex networks, relaying messages between plants, distributing nutrients, and nurturing growth. They’re prolific, too—just one kilogram of soil can contain 200 kilometers of mycelium! Without these quiet workers, life as we know it wouldn’t exist. So yeah, I was sold—mushrooms are not only cool, they’re also fundamental to life on Earth!
But beyond their ecological superpowers, mycelium offers a nearly perfect solution for sustainable building.
Carbon negativity and mycelium
I often talk about carbon negativity through the concept of embodied carbon—the total emissions associated with a product’s lifecycle. Manufacturing highly refined products takes a lot of energy, which creates carbon emissions. But natural products, like bamboo or mycelium, require less energy to produce and, in some cases, can actually store more carbon than they emit, making them carbon-negative. Imagine a direct carbon capture system, but in product form—pulling CO2 from the environment, storing it, and then offering us a carbon-based material to build with. Your mycelium-insulated office could literally be a carbon sink!
Here’s where mycelium truly shines: it digests organic waste, using the nutrients to fuel its own growth. This means it can take waste materials—stuff that would otherwise end up incinerated, releasing CO2—and turn them into something new and useful, effectively capturing carbon and keeping it out of the atmosphere.
A versatile material for the future
One of the things I love most about mycelium is its flexibility. While it’s growing, we can manipulate it into almost any shape we want. It’s lightweight, has high compressive strength, and is a fantastic insulator. I imagine a world where mycelium replaces synthetic acoustic panels, insulation, packaging, and even temporary structures. And once we’re done with it, it can biodegrade naturally, returning to the earth with no need for landfills or incineration.
That’s the beauty of mycelium—it’s a closed-loop material, part of a truly circular economy.
In the end, I chose mycelium as Milli’s flagship material because it’s versatile, has a fascinating life cycle, and can transform literal waste into something beautiful and functional. My hope is that mycelium will spark curiosity and inspire more people to embrace sustainable materials, propelling us into a new generation of bio-based solutions for the buildings of tomorrow.
