After discussing my project with a friend and talking about my final piece we came to the conclusion that the installation is a great idea in terms of highlighting the sustainability issue within the fast fashion industry... But what am I turning my pieces into? What do they become after the installation is over? Am I making anything that is giving each piece another purpose?
This led me to try and come up with more uses for the prints I’ve created. I’d love for some of them to stay as prints that could be used as wall-hangings, but I have so many prints from this project and feel that they could turn into a variety of things.
List of things to give my prints a regenerative life cycle:
Tote bag / drawstring bag
t-shirts / jumpers
purse
AirPods cover
face masks
fabric key chain
reusable make-up remover pads
Bookmarks
I don’t have the time to try out everything on the list but I wanted to at least create a couple examples. I love tote bags and use them almost every day so this seemed like a reasonable and useful thing to create. It was fairly straightforward, because I had enough of the same material extra, so all I had to do was sew the two fabrics together and add straps. Voila!
Another simple way of turning the prints into something other than ‘just a print’ was to make a wallhanging out of one. I chose to use a longer length print for this to cover more space on the wall. By adding adhesive wall hooks and a bamboo stick to roll my print over, all I needed was a space to place it in.
These were ideas for some of the larger prints, but I still had my small scraps remaining that I made for the collages. This made me consider having an additional part to my installation where I have a giveaway that people can take home and create something themselves out of my prints. Not only would a giveaway alongside my installation help me stand out, but it would also provide viewers with a memorable takeaway from the exhibition that keeps my project in their mind, and generate visibility and interest at the event itself. Most importantly, I’ve used all my materials through pieces of leftovers that I’ve turned into prints, that I’m then giving away to others to give my prints a regenerative life cycle, following the methods of circular design.
In order to make sure I have enough give-away prints, I used the last week of uni before half term to print onto all my smaller leftovers, scraps, and remainder fabrics.