Lab-grown 'T. rex leather' handbag unveiled in Amsterdam, but scientists question dinosaur authenticity
A handbag made from purported lab-grown Tyrannosaurus rex leather failed to sell at Paris auction house Drouot on June 11, with bids reaching only around $150,000 against an expected price of over $500,000. The teal clutch, designed by Polish label Enfin Leve and unveiled at Amsterdam's Artis Zoo Museum in April, was created using collagen traces from a T. rex femur found in Montana, reconstructed with AI and largely based on chicken proteins. The auction result raises questions about market appetite for high-concept biotech luxury goods, while scientists debate whether the material contains any genuine dinosaur-derived content at all.
The world's first handbag marketed as 'T. rex leather' went unsold at the Hôtel Drouot auction house in Paris on June 11, after bids fell well short of the €300,000–€500,000 ($347,000–$578,000) estimate set by auctioneer Alexandre Giquello. The teal clutch bag, designed by Polish fashion label Enfin Leve and developed with The Organoid Company, Lab-Grown Leather Ltd., and ad agency VML, was unveiled in April alongside a dinosaur skeleton at Amsterdam's Artis Zoo Museum. According to its creators, the leather was produced by extracting collagen traces from a T. rex femur discovered in Montana roughly 25 years ago, using phylogenetic analysis and AI to reconstruct a protein sequence, inserting that sequence into a bioleather cell line, and sustainably tanning the resulting skin — a nine-step process far more complex than conventional bovine leather production. However, independent scientists have raised serious doubts: paleoproteomics researcher Jan Dekker of the University of Turin told Deutsche Welle that proteins are unlikely to survive 66 million years, and that even if the original fragments were genuine, approximately 90% of the reconstructed protein sequence would derive from chicken rather than dinosaur. Professor Che Connon of Newcastle University, who led the tissue engineering work, has pushed back against skeptics, insisting the process is scientifically valid and that all steps have been proven. The auction's failure to meet its reserve suggests the luxury market was not yet convinced of the bag's value, despite the project's ambition to break new ground in biotech fashion.
Limitations & open questions
The identity and provenance of the specific Montana T. rex fossil used — and whether its collagen fragments have been independently verified as dinosaur-derived in peer-reviewed literature — is not confirmed across any of the sources.
How coverage differed
The New York Post framed the auction prospectively and enthusiastically, emphasizing the bag's novelty and the lead researcher's confidence while treating scientific skepticism as a minor footnote. Deutsche Welle, by contrast, centered its coverage on expert doubts about the material's authenticity, quoting a specialist who called it 'more chicken than anything else,' offering a notably more cautious scientific assessment.
What different sources said
- South China Morning PostCenter
Bag made from ‘T. rex leather’ fails to sell at Paris auction
- The Straits TimesCenter
First leather bag made from T-Rex cells fails to sell at Paris auction
- Deutsche WelleCenter
Lab-grown Tyrannosaurus leather: More chicken than dinosaur?
- New York PostRight
Bona fide T. rex leather purse is going up for auction — and it could fetch $500K
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