Sustainable fashion is set to become a staple trend at future London Fashion Weeks, as the next generation of designers have displayed a talent for incorporating upcycling into collections.
Teams of students involved in London College of Fashion’s Designing For Sustainability project, were challenged to design capsule womenswear collections using materials provided through H&M’s garment collecting scheme.
“It is imperative that we see upcycling as a teachable technique,”said Orsola de Castro, designer and campaigner.
“As it is one of the very few ways to combat mass production, while we wait for recycling technologies to become advanced enough to offer real and effective closed loop solutions.
“As always, the LCF students came armed with talent, dedication and ingenuity.”
Student Jaehwa Rhee, was part of the team who created the ‘Something New’ collection as part of the project.
“This project helped me to think about the potential environmental pollution and hazards created by discarded clothing,” said Rhee.”For all of us that love fashion we need to always consider the environmental issues surrounding it.
“Our collection is focused on a zero-waste concept. We used textile techniques to create a completely new fabric with scraps of unwanted parts of garments. We tried to modify the original elements of the waste garments whilst also displaying the original starting points of the designs.”
The collections can be viewed across five London H&M stores for the duration of London Fashion Week from 16th – 20th September 2016.
Click through the gallery below to learn more about the nine collections created for the project.
This September The Huffington Post UK Style is focusing on all things sustainable, for the second year running. Our thirst for fast fashion is dramatically impacting the environment and the lives of thousands of workers in a negative way. Our aim is to raise awareness of this zeitgeist issue and champion brands and people working to make the fashion industry a more ethical place.
We’ll be sharing stories and blogs with the hashtag #SustainableFashion and we’d like you to do the same. If you’d like to use our blogging platform to share your story, email ukblogteam@huffingtonpost.com.