Smart Clothing Startups funded by Y Combinator (YC) 2026

Honeylove is a DTC startup founded by EDM artist Betsie Larkin. After searching high and low for quality shapewear that made her feel confident on stage, Betsie decided to create her own line of stage-worthy shapewear and launched publicly in 2018. Since then, Honeylove has expanded to tops, bras, and many other garments that have set new standards in their verticals. We apply a technical and artistic approach to problems we see in the fashion industry, creating products that serve our customers of all shapes, sizes, and backgrounds.

SRTX builds new materials and software to enable better textiles. SRTX is best known for its first technology, Sheertex, a knit made from one of the world's strongest polymers which has disrupted hosiery through impossibly strong pantyhose.

Skyscrape makes temperature responsive fabrics for a new type of clothing. These fabrics literally change shape in response to a change in temperature: the fabrics become thicker and insulate more as the temperature drops, and they become thinner and insulate less as the temperature rises again. This "intelligent insulation" has no wires or sensors, and the fabric's shape-changing behavior comes from a natural materials response. Skyscrape’s fabrics offer expanded thermal comfort across a wider temperature range than conventional clothing. Creating textiles that could change shape with changing temperatures required years of laboratory work by an interdisciplinary team of scientists, engineers, designers, and weavers, designing and refining machines and processes to make yarns and fabrics that could adapt to the environment. Skyscrape's first market entry was with Ralph Lauren in the 2022 Team USA Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony.