2013

So much innovative design is inaccessible to those who love fashion most and in the current model of fashion production and consumption designers exist at a distance from the community of fashion lovers that they design for.  For those who love fashion the only real mode of engagement is to consume it.

“See it. Love it. Make it.” encourages an alternative model where the designer has been commissioned to create a product, and the only way to get it is to make it.

We invite you to consider which of your students would benefit from this program most. Workshops for high school students will be run at the stitchery collective studio during the September holidays for students interested in clothing manufacture and fashion, funded by Arts Queensland, with 5 students from each selected school attending.

In these workshops the students will learn about the design process, and make one of the creations from one of Australia’s hottest new designers.

This personal making process not only teaches them valuable skills, but encourages them to think about the effort and talent that goes into each garment they buy, and the environmental and social costs involved in fashion consumption. The workshops will be facilitated by stitchery collective members, who are all designers, teachers and thinkers about fashion and design, and its place in the world.

Designs have been commissioned from up-and-coming lable Diaz, whose collaboration with Sportsgirl gained her international exposure; Sydney based sleepwear label ALAS, which has just started to be stocked by ASOS.com; the delicate and thoughtful designer Carla Binoto, who showed her work in March at Paris Fashion Week; and the very talented QUT Master’s graduate, Mark Neighbour.

The commissioned designs will be available as packs for the wider community to buy, but these workshops represent a unique opportunity for students to experience and engage with fashion in a completely new way.