Concept & Approach
A hand-quilted and patch-work jacket using recycled and virgin materials, inspired by the Hundred Family Jacket in the museum at Donghua University, Shanghai TT6. Using hand quilting to create a layered effect for warmth, comfort and emotional durability, the jacket offers ‘psychic protection’ to designers for when they engage with sustainability.
Rather than a design brief, this jacket symbolises both the material and symbolic aspects of sustainable textile/fashion design. On a material level, the jacket offers possible solutions for the combined use of recycled and virgin materials, using a modular/patchwork design and quilting techniques to make upcycling more efficient and scaleable TT1, TT2. On a symbolic level, the jacket is a metaphor for the psychological change process that designers will go through when they prioritise values that support sustainability.
Sustainability requires both inner and outer change, and designers will need both skills and a ‘sustainability mindset’ when they go into new contexts to collaborate across the supply chain TT7 and in local communities. Just as the Hundred Family Jacket in Shanghai was traditionally made of patchwork pieces to offer psychic protection to orphans by their extended family, this jacket represents the protection and support needed for transformation of textile/fashion designers and the design community TT10. Sustainability requires us to become ‘whole selves’ and this jacket can be a comforting and protective companion on that journey.
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Galleries & Media
Hand-quilted teal green silk, and hand-stitched patchwork of navy wool/linen mix fabrics. Lining is the Chinese word for sustainability’, hand-drawn onto polyester.
Hand-quilted teal green silk, and hand-stitched patchwork of navy wool/linen mix fabrics. Lining is the Chinese word for sustainability’, hand-drawn onto polyester.
Hand-quilted teal green silk, and hand-stitched patchwork of navy wool/linen mix fabrics. Lining is the Chinese word for sustainability’, hand-drawn onto polyester.
Hand-stitching on combinations of wool crepe, polyester satin, silk taffeta, cotton.
Hand-stitching on combinations of wool crepe, polyester satin, silk taffeta, cotton.
Hand-stitching on combinations of wool crepe, polyester satin, silk taffeta, cotton.
Hand-stitching on combinations of wool crepe, polyester satin, silk taffeta, cotton.Hand-quilted teal green silk, and hand-stitched patchwork of navy wool/linen mix fabrics. Lining is the Chinese word for sustainability’, hand-drawn onto polyester.
Diagram of Sustainability as Inner and Outer Work, based on Maiteny & Reed (1998)
Ms. Bricolage, a characterisation of the attributes that designers need when engaging with sustainability
Visual Research for an Alchemic Kit that includes a jacket for ‘psychic protection’ of designers
Concept for Sutra Stitching Workshop, exploring links between hand-stitching and mindfullness/well being
Jacket that inspired the work, seen on street in Shanghai
Hand-made jacket that inspired work, found on street in Shanghai
Visual research of jackets, including the Hundred Family Jacket, as seen in the museum at Donghua University, Shanghai
Visual research of ‘repair’ aesthetic from Shanghai streets
Drawing of Hundred Family Jacket done during workshop with garment workers, Shanghai
Hand-stitched sample done during field research to China
Samples in progress
Sketchbook
Sketch of jacket prototype
Fabric sampling
Jacket being constructed
Writing
Design for Ethical Production
Clara Vuletich | 3 December 2012
Production contexts
Clara Vuletich | 30 April 2014