Overview
- The one‑of‑a‑kind teal handbag went on display in Amsterdam on Thursday under a T. rex replica, with a six‑week run before an auction starting near £500,000.
- Project leaders say they used collagen fragments from T. rex fossils, inserted them into animal cells to produce new collagen, and then processed that into leather.
- Paleontologists Melanie During and Thomas R. Holtz Jr. dispute the label, saying any dinosaur collagen is only fragmentary inside bone and lacks the structure needed to reproduce skin or leather.
- The collaborators are creative firm VML, biotech groups The Organoid Company and Lab‑Grown Leather Ltd., with the bag designed by Polish label Enfin Levé.
- Backers tout environmental benefits such as avoiding chemical tanning and aim to seed demand at the top of the market to normalize lab‑grown materials in fashion.