By Dr Benjamin Droguet, Founder and CEO of Sparxell.
The vivid blue of a Morpho butterfly’s wing is more than a visual wonder. It is a lesson in how colour can exist without chemistry as we currently define it.
That intense blue does not come from toxic chemicals. It comes from microscopic structures that manipulate light itself. No molecules absorb colour. Instead, carefully ordered layers reflect specific wavelengths, creating a colour that is bright, stable and entirely physical.
For decades, scientists have studied how nature creates colour. At Sparxell, we have translated those principles into an industrial technology. Using plant-derived cellulose, we create colour through structure rather than chemical.
The result is a new class of pigments that deliver strong, stable colour without synthetic dyes, heavy metals or fossil-based chemistry. This challenges the foundations of modern colour chemistry.
Most industrial colour still relies on 19th-century chemistry. Coal-tar and petrochemical dyes enabled scale and consistency, but locked industries into systems that are highly polluting, from both the manufacturing and end-of-life perspectives.
Textile dyeing alone uses more than 10,000 chemicals and releases around 1.5 million tonnes of dyes into the environment each year. Dyeing and finishing of fashion items is a 7B dollar market and these steps are responsible for roughly 20 percent of the industry’s water pollution, alongside high energy use and carbon emissions.
The environmental damage is matched by health risks. Many common dyes contain carcinogens, toxic metals or persistent additives. Even where regulation has improved safety, the process remains resource intensive. Water is heated, dyed, rinsed and discharged at scale.
Despite incremental improvements, the model has fundamentally remained the same. Colour is still treated as a chemical input to be manufactured, applied and disposed of.
Its impact is largely invisible to consumers, yet it remains one of the most damaging parts of modern manufacturing. It is not an ignored problem, but existing solutions are incapable of achieving scale and impact.
Nature offers a different model. In many butterflies, birds and plants, colour comes from structure, not chemistry. Abundant, benign materials are arranged with precision.
Cellulose is central to this approach. It is the most abundant biopolymer on Earth, forming the structural backbone of plants. In its natural state, cellulose appears white because it scatters light randomly.
When organised into precise, periodic structures at the nanoscale, as some plants have evolved over millions of years, it can instead reflect specific wavelengths, producing intense colour.
We have developed a patented process that engineers cellulose into photonic structures. These structures create colour through interference and refraction of light without chemicals. By controlling the spacing and organisation of cellulose domains, we can tune the reflected colour across the visible spectrum.
This means the material itself becomes the colourant. There is no added dye, no heavy metal pigment and no synthetic molecule responsible for hue. Colour is encoded physically, not chemically. It is a fundamental shift in colour chemistry, replacing petrochemical synthesis with bio-inspired design.
There is a persistent assumption that sustainable materials require compromise. In colour, this assumption is deeply entrenched. Synthetic dyes are seen as the benchmark for vibrancy and consistency. Natural alternatives are often dismissed as unstable, dull or impractical at scale.
Structural colour challenges that narrative. Because the colour arises from physical structure, it does not fade through chemical degradation in the same way as conventional dyes. In textile applications, our pigments have demonstrated excellent wash and rub fastness against ISO standards, alongside strong colour depth.
Our cellulose-based pigments are also inherently safer. They are biodegradable, non-toxic and plastic-free. Independent testing has shown no toxicity to aquatic organisms even at high concentrations. Unlike many so-called biodegradable pigments or glitters, there are no synthetic polymer carriers contributing to microplastic pollution.
Crucially, this performance does not require new manufacturing infrastructure. Our pigments and inks are formulated to work within existing industrial processes.
Textile mills can use them without modifying equipment. This drop-in compatibility is essential for real-world adoption. Sustainability only scales when it fits operational reality.
Early data suggest significant environmental benefits. Water use can be reduced by up to 90 percent compared to conventional dyeing, as structural colour avoids multiple dye baths and rinse cycles. Energy demand is lower due to simplified processing. Carbon emissions fall both through bio-based feedstocks and reduced process intensity.
Textiles were the obvious starting point. The sector is under regulatory and consumer pressure, and colour is one of its most polluting processes. At the same time, fashion requires speed, consistency and creative freedom. Any alternative must deliver all three.
Our first commercial product is a dye-free textile printing ink tested with Positive Materials, a Portuguese mill known for sustainable manufacturing. The test was simple: could structural colour pigments run on a commercial production line at industrial speed, without changing equipment?
The answer: it does. Positive Materials printed with our structurally coloured ink using their standard machinery, with no process modifications. This proved that cellulose-based structural colour can scale within existing infrastructure. The inks are now commercially available through Positive Materials, showing how quickly cleaner colour can move when it fits into established supply chains. Other manufacturers are taking notices.
Technical validation is essential, but creative validation matters too. Fashion is a visual industry. New colour systems must prove themselves not just in testing labs, but in design studios and on runways.
British designer Patrick McDowell became the first brand to showcase Sparxell’s technology in a fashion collection. The collaboration produced a couture gown and a ready-to-wear dress coloured entirely using our structural pigments. The pieces debuted at Future Fabrics Expo 2025.
One look featured our signature structural blue in both matte and shimmering finishes. The shimmer effect, often achieved with plastic-based or metallic glitter, was created entirely through cellulose microstructures. The response from industry professionals was immediate. Here was colour that delivered visual impact without toxic chemistry or plastic pollution.
This was proof that bio-based structural colour can meet the aesthetic demands of luxury fashion. Since then, we have expanded our colour palette and surface effects, working with early adopter brands across multiple segments.
Sparxell was founded in 2023 as a University of Cambridge spin-out. Since then, we have delivered more than 25 fully funded pilot projects with global brands across textiles, cosmetics and automotive coatings, validating performance and manufacturability.
Production has scaled from lab batches to kilogram volumes, with ton-scale manufacturing planned for 2026. This has been supported by a €1.9 million European Innovation Council grant, alongside Innovate UK grants and sustainability-focused investors, helping de-risk the move from research to industry.
Industry backing has been just as critical. Sparxell was selected for LVMH’s La Maison des Startups accelerator and is working with luxury houses of the likes of Dior, Louis Vuitton and Hermés. Their engagement signals a clear shift: clean colour is no longer niche, but a strategic priority.
The synthetic dye revolution solved scarcity and consistency, but left a legacy of pollution that industry still carries. Colour remains chemically complex, resource intensive and environmentally damaging because viable alternatives did not exist.
That is now changing. Structural colour separates colour from toxic chemistry. It replaces hazardous molecules with material design, using principles nature has refined over millions of years.
The challenge is no longer science or performance. It is adoption at scale. Integrating structural colour into mainstream manufacturing could cut pollution, water use and carbon emissions across multiple sectors.
This is not just a technical shift, but a human one. Colour should not come at the expense of clean water, healthy ecosystems or the communities living downstream. We are entering a new era of colour, where success is measured not only by how it looks, but by the impact it has on people and the planet.
Dr Benjamin Droguet is a materials scientist and the founder and CEO of Sparxell, a University of Cambridge spin-out pioneering plant-based structural colour technology. He holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge. Working alongside Professor Silvia Vignolini, Benjamin developed a breakthrough method for engineering cellulose at scale into microscopic structures that manipulate light to produce vivid, stable colour without toxic chemicals, heavy metals or fossil-based inputs.
