Students make design statement with upcycled fashion collection

Fashion students in Dubai made an environmental statement at a fashion show with an eco-friendly collection.
The event, held by the French Fashion Institute (ESMOD Dubai) at City Walk, showcases creative works produced by their graduating students. While one of the designers created her collection using eco-friendly textiles, another used recycled materials.
Shivangi Suvarna created her graduation collection using damaged and rejected goods to ensure she does not contribute to the wastage crisis caused by the fashion industry.
"A couple of months back ESMOD Dubai made us watch the movie The True Cost, where my entire class was exposed to the dark side of the fashion industry. The movie showed us how the garment factory labourers were treated and neglected, and how they were underpaid, how the fast fashion retailers were major contributors to this wastage crises and turning a blind eye to garment factory labourers," she told Khaleej Times.
"The movie also showed us how the fashion industry is one of the highest polluters of the environment. These major issues were really alarming and I felt the urge to take this issue up as a challenge and take a step towards reducing waste, or at least not contributing to it."
Suvarna approached fashion retailers to avail their dead stock and reached out to family and friends for wasted and unused clothing.
A major part of the materials she used was reconstructed from damaged and rejected jackets, trousers, t-shirts and knitwear. She also sourced other materials, such as lentil sacks and jute from India. "Fashion is a massive contributor to waste which eventually leads to global warming. The only way to solve this issue is for all of the fashion industry to cumulatively decide and agree on cutting down the wastage and making optimum use of dead-stock and damaged items instead of dumping them into landfills," she said.
"Having said that, during my research period, I did notice some of the fashion brands making a positive attempt in their approach towards selling sustainable garments by using eco-friendly fabrics in the manufacturing of apparel."
Another student, Ramona Mardini, used fabrics and threads which were certified from Global Organic Textile Standards and meet their ecological and social standards.
When asked how fashion can make an environmental statement, Mardini said: "It should start from designers practices - by putting sustainability at the core of everything they do to minimise their waste, water and energy footprints. Also, by having social responsibility and thinking of eco fibre. Second, doing it is just not enough - they have to advertise about it to have people see behind the scenes process. I think this will make people open up their practices to scrutiny."
Last week, students from another fashion institute upcycled leftover refugee tent materials to create handbags. They displayed it during a fashion show held a day before the World Refugee Day.
sarwat@khaleejtimes.com