Anja Crabb | MA Fashion & the Environment | London College of Fashion 2012

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TRANSIENCE◊

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If fashion is “the eternal reoccurrence of the new”, does this not inherently create a dilemma if sustainable means durable?

Design academic Stuart Walker notes that there are key elements that can be used for working towards sustainability. The inherent notions of fashion are time and change, but change itself is neither positive nor negative – the nature of the change is important. While fashion overemphasizes materialism as a means for happiness and success, it can also be used as a tool for transformation. In short: durability is often falsely equated to sustainability while the transistory nature of fashion can in fact be harnessed as a catalyst for change.

We should assume that what we design will not be appropriate in the future, eco design pioneer Victor Papanek agrees. We must also not just acknowledge but appreciate the presence of fashion as a mechanism in most areas of life and use it to our advantage to foster creativity that can lead to the exploration of new solutions.

In keeping with these chains of thoughts, I became aware of Young Ju Do, an MA Textile Futures graduate at Central Saint Martins college who had developed jewellery made of compostable plastic. We collaborated and examined its possible application in garments. As it deteriorates and degrades, it is also an appropriate metaphor for memory.

Another exploration that was inspired by transience was what started out as a game with my 4 1/2 year old niece, Charlotta. When she discovered the dot stickers in my posession, she went about deorating me and herself with them: very systematically, in certain patterns, on freckles and symmetrically on knees, ears, elbows etc. The stickers represent a playful, experiential and ephemeral expression of fashion. The embodied act itself will create the memory, as opposed to the artefact itself.

PREFACE

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Photography: Henry Connor

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Lightfastness test: Stickers on naturallydyed silk - onion-skins, tea, elderberry, madder, coffee, cabbage.

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◊DURABILITY IS OFTEN FALSELY EQUATED TO

SUSTAINABILITY WHILE THE TRANSITORY

NATURE OF FASHION CAN IN FACT BE HARNESSED AS A CATALYST FOR

CHANGE.◊

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BIOPLASTIC

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BIOPLASTIC DESIGN EXPERIMENTATION

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BIOPLASTIC DISSOLVING EXPERIMENTATION

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◊“WE SHOULD ASSUME

THAT OUR DESIGNS WILL NOT BE RELEVANT

IN THE FUTURE”. ◊

© Victor Papanek

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100% recycled stockDesign - williamhuxford.eu

Special thanks to Charlotta Connor for thedots and Young Ju Do for the bio-plastic.

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