Cloud: MeteorosLast night we attended the launch for CSF Researcher Lucy Orta’s latest artwork.
The press have raved about the stunning piece with features in BBC News, The Guardian, The Independent and The Daily Mail amongst others.
Cloud: Meteoros will be hanging beautifully from the ceiling in St Pancras Station until the end of 2013.
Marks & Spencer and Oxfam are opening a two-day pop-up charity store in the M&S flagship store at Marble Arch, for 24-25 January. The pop-up shop will offer the public a chance to buy rare vintage M&S pieces as well as clothing donated by celebrities simple by ‘shwopping’ an item of their own. ‘Shwopping’ is a concept derived by M&S and Oxfam to encourage people to donate or ‘gift’ unwanted clothing that will go on to be re-used, transformed or recycled. Sarah Farquhar, Head of Retail Brand for Oxfam, said:
“Oxfam shops are full of hidden treasures and we have regular shoppers who turn up week in week out to get their hands on the latest donations. But this time we are doing the rummaging for them; bringing the best of the shwopped items we have received over the last few months plus exciting celebrity donations straight to the public instead. It will be really exciting to see people browsing Oxfam clothing in the middle of an M&S store.”
CSF and M&S installation ‘Beautiful Layers’
In support of the ‘Gift Away, Don’t Throw Away’ campaign the Centre for Sustainable Fashion has created three installations for the M&S Shwop Shop which can be found on display inside the Marble Arch store now. The three installations; ‘Transformation’, ‘Beautiful Layers’ and ‘Gift it Away’ are designed to encourage a new culture of ‘gifting away’ instead of throwing away, to draw on existing resources instead of wasting limited ones. You can see these installations in the Marble Arch store from today until January 25. Donators who visit the Shwop Shop will be able to tell the story around their gifted item and throughout the two days a tweeter in residence will be capturing the stories behind the clothes and broadcasting them via @shwopping.
CSF and M&S installation ‘Transformation’
For more information on Marks & Spencer and Oxfam’s Shwop Shop visit http://social.marksandspencer.com/
Shwop Shop is open from 9am – 9pm on Thursday 24th & Friday 25th January
Ground Floor Marks & Spencer 458 Oxford Street London W1C 1AP
Ethical fashion and art collective Conquer Gear is a diverse collective of artists and imaginers fronted by Sebastian Stobbs and Tomoya Hiramatsu creating a wide range of innovative and provocative design across different mediums – everything relating to the printed image and written word – fashion, film, photography, art. The company has a strict ethical policy supporting the Environmental Justice Foundation’s Clean Cotton Campaign and all cotton fabrics are clearly labelled with country of origin.
They have created a special Pop Up shop featuring a capsule collection of clothing, an exclusive photographic exhibition and curated range of crafts in Sydenham, running until Christmas Eve. Local residents and Londoners are fast spreading the news, with John Malkovich becoming a recent fan and an editorial magazine feature on ethical fashion coming up early next year.
Conquer’s Wardrobe was launched through The Shop Revolution, a high impact project that aims to bring empty units back into use and interest to the high street through the introduction of pop up shops. This project is one of three strands of the South London SEE3 Portas Pilot Project.
Regular Friday evening events and activities until 9pm throughout the Pop Up period.
A special event will be held on Friday 21st December at 7pm with a special 45 minute acoustic set from Mishaped Pearls.
On the day of the launch, Saturday December 1st, Sebastian Stobbs was amazed by the response and said: “It was over in a second, everyone coming into the shop had enormous enthusiasm for what was trying to be achieved in their community. We didn’t stop chatting with people all day long. It was just so nice to see how many people had come out to join in.”
Inspiring change makers are emerging!
Masters level study engaging a deep exploration of sustainability principles, applied to fashion is creating distinctive and dynamic new work. There are few courses that offer this opportunity, so when Centre director, Dilys Williams met Friederike when Dilys co hosted the Copenhagen Youth Fashion Summit this year, they looked for ways in which the two courses MA Fashion and the Environment here at LCF and MA Sustainability in Fashion at ESMOD Berlin could create a dialogue. Dilys is a jury member for the graduating Berlin students, alongside Michael Braungart and other media and industry leaders, who each offered opportunities to the graduating students. Centre for Sustainable Fashion is mentoring Cara Sumpton to help to support her as she develops her ideas for the future.
Cara’s CV City Vintage project stood out through demonstrating the potential of a retail store that houses every step of the supply chain under one roof.
Cara’s view on the future of fashion
“I would like to see less mass production and more local production. Eventually, I would like to see cities operating independently by growing their own fibre for textile production. This would grow local ecology and create more diversity in products around the world. Like cheese and wine, I believe fashion can be more distinctive to each region.”
CV City Vintage – About the project
CV City Vintage began with an idea for a retail store that houses every step of the supply chain under one roof. The fibre would be grown on the rooftop garden, the fabric would be made in-house with micro scale production methods, designers would work creatively with new and used materials, and the customers would be exposed to the entire process from inside the store. By physically closing the gap between processes, the system is naturally transparent.
About the collection
The City Vintage bag collection is made from locally sourced vintage materials found in Berlin. Cara believe’s that working with local materials is a way to shift the fashion industry from a system of mass production and maximizing profits to a system of local production and growing local industry. As observed in Cradle to Cradle (2002), “The idea of local sustainability is not limited to materials, but it begins with them.”
The Centre for Sustainable Fashion Director, Dilys Williams was invited to speak about the social role of fashion and its interaction with the natural environment at Rio de Janeiro’s first Fashion and Sustainability Discute Internacional, organised by Rio Moda Brazil. Other keynote speakers included Designer, Ronaldo Fraga who spoke about Brazilian culture and sustainability, Nina Braga from Instituto E, who spoke about the role of government, industry and academia and Sociologist, Dario Caldas who discussed the context of contemporary society and economy in Brazil.
Brazil recently overtook the UK to become the world’s sixth largest economy, with the textile and fashion sectors being the second largest employers in Brazil. As a country rich in natural resources, Brazil faces many environmental, social and economic threats and opportunities, there is still a need for the issue of sustainability to be given a formal priority as an increasing number of companies incorporate sustainability practices in their everyday business. Rio Moda has provided an excellent platform to build and strengthen networks with a view to further industry collaboration, and exchange knowledge and research opportunities in social and environmental project areas.
Last weeks spring/summer 2013 Fashion East show took place at 50 St James and showcased designers Claire Barrow, Maarten van der Horst and Ryan Lo. Watch Lou Stoppard, Frances Corner, Marion Hume, and Dilys Williams discuss the Fashion East show live as it happens below:
Read more about the designers and Fashion East here
Photograph by Ana Escobar
Thank you to those who participated in the Centre for Sustainable Fashion‘s Transformational Thinking and Practice Field Day. The wonderful contributions from everyone in the room made it a truly innovative and inspiring day. Frances Corner, Head of London College of Fashion, introduced the Field Day before a series of interesting discussions and workshops took place through out the day.
Photograph by Ana Escobar
Watch is this space for CSF’s next publication, showcasing all of the exciting outcomes generated at the Field day.
Antarctica World Passport | Métisse Flag
1 June – 9 September 2012
Festival of the World, Southbank Centre
Southbank Centre’s Festival of the World is a celebration of how art can change lives and what it means to be a citizen of the world. Across its 21-acre site, Southbank Centre has brought together artists from around the globe who are demonstrating that when people work creatively together, individual lives and communities can change for the better. For the festival Prof Lucy Orta of the Centre for Sustainable Fashion + Jorge Orta have been commissioned to create two ambitious new works from their Antarctica series: Métisse Flag and the Antarctica World Passport Delivery Bureau.
The Antarctic Treaty signed in 1959 states that Antarctica is a common territory dedicated to cultural and scientific cooperation and all military activity is banned. Antarctica exemplifies a community that strives for peace and social progress.
The artists’ Antarctica World Passport Delivery Bureau, a huge labyrinth installation of reclaimed materials inside the Southbank’s Spirit Level Gallery will issue 30,000 facsimile passport documents to the festival visitors aspiring to become a citizen of the new Antarctica world community. The applicants will join the tens of thousands of citizens who have already received an individual passport, an original artwork to be treasured and passed on the future generations as a testament to share common ideals.
Their second artwork, a monumental crown of flags will be raised above the roof of the Royal Festival Hall. The Métisse Flag, which was first created for their Antarctic expedition in 2007, will stand proudly over looking the river Thames as a symbol of the festival, allowing all peoples to coexist harmoniously as the nations’ emblems merge to create a larger common identity.
The Slow Textiles Group presents An Analysis of Status Anxiety as Manifest in the Fashion System, A public lecture designed to inspire dialogue around the subject of status anxiety that resides within our fashion system.
May 30th 2012 7:15pm
Taking place at The Strategy Lab, HUB Westminster
New Zealand House, 80 Haymarket London SW1Y 4TE Buy tickets here
Images of CSF, Michelle Lowe-Holder and Noel Stewart
The Centre for Sustainable Fashion has teamed up with M&S and Oxfam to create London’s very first Sustainable Fashion Lab, launching April 26. London’s leading designers, stylists and industry leaders will come together to explore and debate a sustainable fashion industry in a series of events, workshops and exhibitions running for two weeks at the Old Truman Brewery in Brick Lane.
April 26 – 9 May 2012
Open between 10am-5pm every day (except Mondays)
Open to the public, for entry bring along one item of unwanted clothing.
