Idea Development

*Highlight*

Mentoring Sessions

1st session with Najah Onn:

Feedback: .."After presenting my research findings and my collection ideas to Miss Najah Onn, she shared with me some information about a natural dye, Indigo that I could add to what I already have as I mentioned that I'm going to implement the color royal blue - she said from the color alone, I could tell a background story about the color Indigo since they're basically kind of look like the same. She shared with me a website I could visit to read an article about the information she shared with me earlier. It was beneficial because I felt like I need more interesting facts that I could relate to my design to make my message and research stronger."

Click here to see the website Najah Onn shared with me!!!

2nd Session with Najah Onn:

Feedback: .."Basically, this is going to be my last time meeting with her. So, during my second time, I was just updating her on what I did from what she suggested to me in the recent meeting. She didn't ask me to change or to add anything else anymore since I have full filled her suggestions from last week."

1st Session with Mr. Hatta Dolmat:

Feedback: .."Since my meeting with him was held after both of my mentoring session with Najah Onn, he was already quite satisfied with everything that I showed him as all of my research have been updated since the beginning so, in term of messages and research, I already have everything ready. So, during the session, I was just looking forward to his opinions on what I did for my design. He said there was nothing much he could say about this anymore because all left to do now for me was to get to sewing. I also showed him my texture samples and he was really interested in my first sample.".

2nd Session with Mr. Hatta Dolmat:

Feedback: .."This was the last time I had a mentoring session with him. At this point, I just showed him the physical design which is some of the designs that draped on the dummy since the last time he only saw them in pictures. I asked for his advice on how can I sew all of my dismantled pieces together and I also specifically told him that my solution is to make a base. He suggested I use a cotton drill since it's a pretty suitable fabric to hold the denim fabrics and all of the dismantled pieces that I will sew over the base. It was a very quick session, I show my design...he told me what fabric to use and my job is done for now.".

Here's the link to access my flipbook!

For the project, I was assigned to do research on a topic that's titled responsible consumption and production. So I'm just gonna straightforwardly jump into this in terms of what I wanna do for my collection and how am I going to connect my design with my messages

Firstly Let's take a look at my research findings. This is very straight to the point because for me this is the most important thing that I need to know when building my concept and I will talk more about that soon. 

So, When I first heard of the title responsible consumption and production, the immediate thing that popped up in my head straight away is fast fashion. As we all know fast fashion is undoubtedly speeding towards environmental disaster as stated in the picture here:

Fashion is responsible for 10 percent of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions and 20 percent of global wastewater and uses more energy than the aviation and shipping sectors combined.

Let me give you some examples:

Fast fashions impacts on water: 

Global fashion also consumes 93 billion metric tons of clean water each year, about half of what Americans drink annually. Cotton is especially a material that needs A LOT of water. For example, one kilogram of cotton used to produce a pair of jeans can consume 7,500 to 10,000 liters of water—the amount a person would drink over 10 years. Even, the dyeing process for fabrics, which uses toxic chemicals, is responsible for 17 to 20 percent of global industrial water pollution.

The fast fashion industry also contributes to climate change due to greenhouse gas emissions. The fashion industry produces 1.2 million metric tons of CO2 each year, according to a  study. In addition, the fashion industry also uses large amounts of fossil fuel-based plastic for packaging and hangers. Then of course when we talk about fast fashion, we talk about waste due to excessive consumption or production of clothes. Actaully only less than one percent of clothing is recycled to make new clothes. The fibers in clothing are polymers, long chains of chemically linked molecules. So that means when you Wash and wear the clothes, it shortens and weakens these polymers, so by the time a garment is discarded, the polymers are too short to turn into a strong new fabric. In addition, most of today’s textile-to-textile recycling technologies till these days still cannot separate out dyes, contaminants, or even a combination of fabrics such as polyester and cotton.

So, without a doubt, the fast fashion industry or fashion industry, in general, needs to change the way they operate especially in textiles manufacturing.

Now we're going to talk about my fashion campaign and what I'm planning to do for my collection. as u heard just now, I stated some of the major impacts of fast fashion on the planet. So since there are a number of impacts in a few different areas - for my collection, I'm only gonna focus on one impact which is water pollution, and ill tell you why :)...keep reading

Btw, this is just my customer profile. Feel free to zoom in on the picture to read the whole thing!

In terms of concept. I wanted to go in black. all black. but I always knew since the beginning that I want to incorporate some royal blue accent as a symbol of hope and positivity because I've mentioned before that to me blue is a happy-sad color. despite my love for black in the intention to keep my identity as an individual when designing a collection, I also use black for the collection as an interpretation of my own perceptions regarding this issue because even as a naive person about this problem I also feel like its bad

So that leads to the most important aspect of my design element. after getting feedback from Najah Onn. I visited the website that she shared previously, and apparently indigo was actually a natural dye that was extracted from the leaves of the Indigofera plant. as we know, humans have been dying fabric as far back as 2600 bc. But back then, dyes were made of natural resources like fruits, minerals plants, and other natural resources which means in the making process there were little or no harmful chemicals used. for example, indigo which is the color you mentioned before, indigo was actually a dye that was derived from a plant called indigo. which is actually a plant that is indigenous to South East Asia and India. what makes the color so special is the fact that it doesn't need a mordant for the color to stick to the fabric and slow down the fading process. another, cool thing about this indigo dye is the fact that natural indigo is made from an organic fermentation process that gives back to the ecosystem through its wastewater that can be used as fertilizer.

Click here to see the website Najah Onn shared with me!!!

After reading the article, I learned the pros and cons of using synthetic dyes and natural dyes. for instance, natural dyes tend to be more expensive as larger quantities of plants would be required to produce the same color of dye. to give you a perspective at least 13 acres of land to grow dye that would effectively color one acre of cotton. This, from a business perspective, doesn’t make sense if you’re producing fast fashion that is required to be cheap/affordable. unlike, artificial dyes they allowed people to scale up productions in a way that made economic sense. not only that, but synthetic dyes also broadened the range of colors people could create in terms of diversity and intensity so people could make whatever colors they want. However, all of these colors come at a cost. They pollute the environment far more than natural colors. This dye is composed of chemical compounds containing elements like lead, mercury, and copper that can be harmful to human bodies and the environment as a whole.

Natural dyes may appear to be the winner due to their smaller environmental footprint, but they are not cost-effective or sustainable on a large scale. Synthetic dyes are more versatile and cost-effective for manufacturers, but they have a high pollution footprint. without a doubt Both dyes have disadvantages yet there is pressure to meet consumer demand.

When I was doing research on its impacts on the environment especially the research on water pollution. I saw a lot of pictures of polluted water that is being mixed with dyes. so I immediately got an idea for that. Basically, these are the photos I found on the internet. do you see that sort of bubbly effect on the water surface?  My idea is to use that toxic chemical effect as my design element. I show you an example here - I just trace the photo following the lines and use that as my element of design. Basically, this is how I'm going to connect my design thinking with my message by incorporating this toxic chemical effect within my designs. so that when people look at the garments and they see these interesting textures I will have something to share with them because these textures are about water pollution. 

Anyways........ here are some examples of how I'm going to incorporate the textures and also how my collection is gonna look based on the concept I just talked about earlier. These are all of the 10 designs that I draped using some dismantled used clothes. They are basically the same things but with different compositions. 

However, after discussing with my lovely lecturers, we agree to proceed with these 3 designs as my final looks :)

This is my sustainable meter and I got a score of 9 according to my sustainable meter:

Lastly, this is my photo shoot idea for my campaign. Since I'm focusing on water pollution, I'm just imagining somewhere with water. I personally feel like it doesn't have to be somewhere extremely polluted or dirty just to show deliver the message because I'm just gonna let my garments and the models do the talk. I hope it does make sense because my garments are basically the focal point and the background which could be a lake or a river or whatever that is, is just to show the natural world that we are destroying.

Photoshoot Session

(INSERT MORE PICTURES)

Without further ado, I am proud to share with you what I have come out with for my final editorial shoot. This project was also a collaboration with creative media students. They are the ones who were in charge during our photo shoot session.

This is just an additional picture that I took during my final presentation!

However, here's CLICK HERE to learn more about the campaign!!

The End :)

(I'll write a reflection soon, gotta finish other projects first)