Material resourcefulness
Garments are fusions of materials and energy brought to the body in myriad configurations, yet the dominant force in fashion, consumerism, tends to value only a narrow spectrum of fashion activity. The practices of material resourcefulness broaden this view and show a burgeoning testing ground of an alternative flows of fibre, fabric and product.
Laundry top
"This is a tunic. And it’s made out of a sarong. It’s just piece of material. I lived and worked in Africa for the past three years ago. And I was in Mombasa on holiday. And part of my job is sourcing. So I love looking at peoples, clothes lines, their wash lines and I saw this sarong hanging on a wash line of a place I was hanging out at. And I said, ‘can I buy that from you?’ …I had a tailor sew it into a tunic.
And I want to make like a thousand of them and sell them. It’s just two seams and it’s just like a hem around the neck and the fringe just comes! I like that it was someone’s wrapper for their skirt, some Kenyan lady. And she was looking at me like, ‘you’re insane’. You want to buy my laundry? And I was like, ‘yes, please, I’d like to buy your laundry."
New York - January 2013
Photograph by
Ellinor Stigle
