Mycelium @ Home
Winter 2021-22
Growing and Experiments
Oyster Mushroom Mycelium
Binder for Bio-based Materials
Inspired by mycelium products seen at Dutch Design Week as well as applications in furniture making, I was curious about the process and steps needed to grow mycelium. This material exploration was done as part of my master thesis research phase.
Mycelium is not a bio-based material on its own and requires a substrate in order to lead it into the desired form. Agriculture waste, as found in my master thesis, can be utilised as the medium for growth when pressed into a form. However, there are steps prior to mycelium placement in a substrate that is needed when working from a mushroom sample to a product.
image 1-2 | mycelium pigeon towers by Arne Hendriks and Mediamatic at 2021 Dutch Design Week
image 3 | the growing pavilion by Biobased Creations and Dutch Design Foundation at Floriade Expo 2022
image 4 | mycelium acoustic paneling by Mogu in the exploded view beyond building pavilion at 2021 Dutch Design Week
figure 1 | steps for transferring mushroom sample to mycelium growth in a mould
Mycelium can be grown from any type of mushroom and the type of mushroom determines the properties of the mycelium. Many product companies that work with mycelium, protect intellectual knowledge of the strain of mushroom utilised. For this experiment, oyster mushrooms were used based on accessibility and the rate of mycelium growth. Only one sample was contaminated and was not utilised in the culture extraction for grain spawn growth.
image 5 | mushroom sample on agar day 1
image 6 | mushroom sample with mycelium growth on agar day 14
image 7 | mushroom sample with mycelium growth on agar day 28
image 8 | mushroom sample 2 with contamination on day 28
image 9 | mushroom sample 5 on day 28
image 10 | mushroom sample 7 on day 30 after mycelium culture for grain spawn growth in containers
image 11 | mixing and making of grain spawn in containers
image 12 | covering with aluminium foil and placing in pressure cooker
image 13 | remove from pressure cooker after sterilisation and then place agar/mycelium culture in the grain spawn container
image 14-16 | container sample 1, 2, and 3 growth after 30 days
image 17 | container sample 3 growth after 50 days
After two months, much of the grain spawn was consumed by the mycelium. It was found that the larger containers did not have complete growth of the mycelium and that the density of grain spawn had somehow limited the mycelium growth. The smaller sample containers were completely filled with mycelium and liquid culture begun gathering at the bottom of the container, seen in image 21, as it appeared that the continued growth of the mycelium produced this liquid.
For future experiments, the liquid culture could be utilised as the medium of transferring the mycelium from the grain spawn to the material substrate mould for application.
image 18-21 | container sample 1, 2, and 3 after 100 days
