Senorita Awesumo: waste what????? all about processes!!!!!!


3 bags of fabric collected from St Clair Design.

What are we wasting? by the bags I've collected from 2 places in Dunedin a lot!!!! I originaly wanted to collect waste from the fashion school, but there just isn't enough. So in realising I wasn't collecting enough fabric I decided to approach local designers and factories, I also realised that I needed enough of the same fabric to make something cohesive and as its a collection of pieces they needed to do this. So I approached many places in Dunedin, a few already had waste initiatives in place, handing pieces off to others for reuse in textile art, to community groups, schools and artists. Others using the waste exchange www.wasteexchange.co.nz. Only one place had no initiatives in place except for giving them to people who come in and ask. which is definitely a good way of getting rid of it but what happens when no one wants it???


back - jersey knit 1

Front - jersey knit 1

So it's been my goal to show people how useful that fabric actually is. I've collected fabric from St Clair Designs and Adventure Outfitters. Let's start with St Clair Design, They have very colourful fabric which is great and a lot of different types such as drills, lycra's, wools, knits, chiffon, silk and linings. the fabric I was most excited about was the jersey knits, these were great to work with as a first experiment as I realised that working this way would be easier without having to deal with closures as most seams wouldn't be straight or aligned properly.and I was right, I really like the as yet unfinished outcome, it made me want to do more. I continued on with other fabrics that I had from St Clair Designs and tacked together at least 6 garments. I then realised I wasn't going to have enough of the same fabrics to make a 3 piece collection that was as cohesive as I wanted it to be, as I would need to gather more of these fabrics to fulfill that, St Clair designs doesn't have a big output at this stage of the year, I have managed to collect only 4 bags from them but have asked for exclusiveness for the next few months to continue collecting and collating fabrics for next semesters project.

However the opportunity arose for me to collect 2 bags from Adventure Outfitters, they are a CMT business mostly specialising in uniforms, they do have a small range of their own as well. They also outsource to smaller designers here in Dunedin. I was fortunate to get a bag of merino and as they CMT they do more lays when cutting so I found the same pieces many times over, this was very exciting as I knew this could be more profitable for me in having enough material to create a cohesive collection. The colour pallette was also very good black, grey, red, purple, blue. These all work well together. I have worked on 4 pieces consistently a hoody, 2 tops and a dress. I didn't know they were going to end up as these at the start I just went with where I thought the pieces should go, made decisions about seams and gathers. I will talk more about these pieces in a later post.

The process starts with collecting and collating the fabric into different types, it took me 3 1/2 hours to sort through the first three bags from St Clair Design, but then only 1/2 hour for the one bag from Adventure Outfitters, as this was only filled with 5-7 different types of fabric. In hindsight I probably should have weighed the bags and been more technical about the amount of waste I was collecting and eventually using. But hey I'm not a numbers girl so it really didn't matter. It's more about what can be done with that fabric. How it can still be utilised to make garments. I have found that this is definitely possible. It is one way of using the waste fabrics, instead of having to pattern make the waste out, it can be used for embellishments or to make more clothes.
So after sorting the fabric, it is layed out on the floor so you can see the different shapes and sizes of pieces(negative spaces from cutting), draping around the form starts from there. It is about placement and sewing with the right tensions to create nice pieces. sometimes you make a mistake and have to cut a piece off, but that's fine as it's experimenting with what can be done and how different shapes can be made to fit together. This is done by gathering and pleating in to create ease and fit. It is a fairly simple process when working with knit fabric. I have alot more experimentation to undertake working with woven fabrics, this will be the next challenge.