BIC Pen Dress

Here’s an idea – next time the ink in your pen runs out, don’t chuck it in the bin, get creative with all of those tubes of plastic. Take inspiration from Annette Carey who has designed this dress made from the humble BIC ball point pen barrels. To celebrate BIC Cristal pen’s 60th anniversary, the dress was designed to appear in an exhibition at the Museum of Brands, Packaging and Advertising for one month from 1st April.

The dress is made from 1,200 BIC barrels, 2000 Swarovski crystals, and weighs 8lbs. Talk about upcycling! Basic pen to stunning dress in just 640 man hours. . .

Earth Hour: Climate change

Tonight, Sat 26th March, is Earth Hour. Are you joining in? Earth Hour started in Sydney in 2007 when 2.2 million people turned their lights off to make a stand against climate change. Last year was the biggest Earth Hour ever with 128 countries taking part. Organised by WWF, Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines and China have already turned off on mass to recognise Earth Hour, and I plan to do the same at 8:30 this evening.

I have to say, I’m pretty good at turning lights off. In fact it really annoys me when I see lights on unnecessarily, once you start to give it more thought it just becomes habit to switch them off. Obviously turning off lights for just an hour isn’t going to make a huge amount of difference to climate change, but the publicity around the event aims to make people continue to think about the issue after the hour is up. Climate change remains an issue for debate. World temperatures reached a global high in 1998, but fluctuated in the following years, leading some people to believe that climate change ‘stopped’ in 1998. In early 2011 the World Meteorological Organisation announced that 2010 was the joint hottest year on record along with 1998 and 2005.

There is no doubt that the temperature of the Earth has been steadily rising for decades, but I do understand where the sceptics out there are coming from. Some scientists and members of the public alike, argue that ‘climate change’ is a natural change in the Earth’s life cycle, having been through a number of dramatic climatic changes over the last 4 billion years. This may be the case, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that human activity is now intervening. Atmospheric chemist, Paul Crutzen, coined the term ‘anthropocene’ in 2000 to explain the affect that human activity is having on the world. He stated that we are entering a new geological era (the anthropocene era) due to the affect of human activity. If humans destroy the Earth by using up fossil fuels and causing global warming, they are destroying themselves as a species, the Earth, however, will live on as it has done in previous millennia. Of course, some say that the Earth does a good enough job causing disasters itself, just witness the terrible earthquake in Japan.

I often think, hey, it will be ok, the human species will adapt. Advances in technology and science will allow us all to live a carbon neutral life. Or will they? I don’t know. What I do believe, is that humans don’t have the right to mess with nature and our current way of life has become unsustainable.

Textiles: New Research Strategies

On March 19th 2011, the Textile Society held its first research symposium. The event aimed to facilitate the exchange of research within textiles and I went along as an audience member. I had hoped to speak about my carbon footprinting research but in the end they were overrun with speakers, so I have written a piece for their journal TEXT instead.

As textiles have become a growing academic area of research, the topics under its umbrella are far and wide. The morning session included papers on textile histories, something I have only little knowledge about but am learning. There was also discussion on the way in which textiles are exhibited in museums, and exciting news about the Clothworkers’ Centre for Textiles and Fashion Study, which will open in 2013 as part of the V&A.

The afternoon looked at more contemporary issues and critical thinking behind fashion and textiles. Although thought provoking, there were times when it felt a little ‘wishy washy’. Nonetheless, there were some great ideas for the future, including the use of concrete on clothing to absorb pollutants in the air. Hopefully the event will happen in future years, it is always great to belong to these societies but the value of community is heightened when you have a chance to meet like minded people and swap ideas.

Oscars Dress

It’s a bit late, but after my post about Livia Firth’s Green Carpet Challenge in Jan (she set herself the challenge of wearing ethical clothes to every red carpet event through award season) I have to comment on the Oscars dress. She chose ethical couture designer Gary Harvey and the results were stunning. A floor length corseted creation in ivory, it was upcycled from 11 vintage frocks!

New Eco Fashion Book

'Eco Fashion' by Sass Brown was published late last year. It joins a quickly expanding topic area of books with vastly varying qualities. This book is great overview of the industry, but is not an academic text. Sass Brown is a Professor at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York, and the book takes an American view, which is a slight downside, just because many of the designers are based in the US.

After a short introduction, the bulk of the book profiles around a hundred designers, including lots I hadn’t heard of! It is split into 5 chapters showcasing brands that are ethical in different ways, such as fair trade and slow design. It’s a lovely shiny book, easy to read and a nice addition to the book shelf.

Survey Results

I got my MPhil survey results back months ago (how time flies!) and I’ve been busy analysing and drawing conclusions from them. The online survey was the second part of my MPhil methodology for the communicating ethical fashion project and I targeted individuals within the age range of 18 to 30 who either work or study at the University. Choosing the sample was hard enough because ideally I would have liked to have had a sample representative of the whole of the UK, but of course that would be near impossible for just myself to complete. The reason for choosing the sample I did was because I had easy access to this group, young people generally shop regularly, and they have a whole lifetime of shopping ahead of them. They can more easily be moulded perhaps . . . the new ‘sustainable’ generation.

I had 89 responses which I was slightly disappointed with, however that changed when I began analysing! I had to get to grips with statistical testing for the first time, something I am keen to get better at if I want a career in research. I coded qualitative answers into themes, worked out means, medians, calculated scores and compared variables. Although I had touched on many of these areas before, it was still a steep learning curve.

As expected, it is difficult to draw significant conclusions from a fairly small sample; there were certainly no statistically significant points to variable changes. However, it was encouraging to see a strong ethical agenda and environmental awareness. When it came to shopping for clothes, the majority were regular and engaged consumers. There is definitely potential there to lead them to greater tools of communication. I was surprised how many respondents had heard of a number of ethical brands, not just People Tree but the smaller brands too. That said, not many had shopped with these ethical brands. A fair number of respondents described ethical fashion as bland, unfashionable, expensive, or hippie-ish, not an unusual connotation but still frustrating as there are so many beautiful/cool ethical garments out there. There was a reasonable awareness of terms like ‘organic’ and ‘fairtrade’ which was great, but a lack of specific responses.

To be honest, consumers shouldn’t have to be the ones making sacrifices, all garments should be ethical.