Survival of the Outfit

We were welcomed into Term Two by Claire Farrell from Extinction Rebellion who in addition to painting a clear picture about the inspiration for their cause, introduced us to an existing fashion practice of using paper to trace out an outfit structure. She was kind enough to carry along a one-meter width roll of paper with standardised to one-inch cut marks to get the job done.

Sketching exercise

We were given a task of generating thirty-second sketch ideas in regard to the brief from our tutors, John Fass, Alaistair Steele and Tonicha Child after Claire's presentation.

A fashion trick

Each of us had a go at using pattern paper to mark with pencil and cut with scissors sub-section traces of a cloth outfit. This enabled us appreciate the amount of effort it takes fashion designers to realise their design ideas.

Realising the sketch

This involved transformation of the sketches into reality through use of the newly acquired skill. Lucky for us, we had brought along some cloth that we modified into our desired outfit. We used scissors to cut away parts of the knee area and then covered the area with thread to hold it in place.

Drill outcome

After a wholesome session, this was out final output for the drill. The outfit targeted encouragement of people to use their clothes for longer periods than constantly buying new ones and to embrace broken parts of our community through stitching the cut area together.

A personal story

As the brief required our design to bring people together and build community resilience, an idea quickly struck Jumleena about immigration as she quickly related it back home to an ongoing immigrant conflict between the neighbouring states of India and Bangladesh. It quickly turned personal!

We established that in 2019, there was a huge protest that broke out in the state of Assam, the people were against the government for passing the Citizen Amendment bill (CAA) where immigrants would be given refuge. This meant that the citizens were in a symbiotic relationship with the immigrants and if they they could be more accepting of one another, they could attain a balanced ecosystem where both sides benefit from one another.

Finding proof

We dug into News and other media outlets for articles about the topic to have better grasp and a much wider view of the story.

First-person experiences

The media does tell stories, but they are mostly told from a general point of view and we needed a first-person angle as our design aimed to narrate a personal story. Jumleena was able to source for and provide screenshots which her friends had posted through social media.

We looked at reference images from the internet about immigrants especially from Asia to be able to get a hold of their outfits and also put together a list of items they normally carry along together with their families. These included sanitary items, photographs, travel documents, food and others.

What is out there!

To solidify our idea, we also looked at projects from Pinterest from other designers who have executed similar project ideas. This enabled us make aesthetic comparisons and have a better standing position of item placement.

Sketching the outfit

To be able to communicate the idea of community and compassion, we sketched out ideas to help us visualise the contrast between an immigrant and citizens.

Sourcing for material

We went out to cloth market to buy material for our outfits. We acquired a net-like material that we would then use to attach immigrant possessions and peach coloured linen that for a luxurious contrast. In addition, were pants whose edges from opposite ends were to be cut and joined together.

Branding

Being a new ’fashion house’, we needed an identity and after a long quest for a name, we settled on Nomad Couture. It carried with it a meaning of movement that reasonated with our project. Below are the branding assets we designed:

Below is a photo of us working on the logo, flyer and other branding assets of Nomad Couture with Jumleena, Lingjia and Marty assisting with the design direction and myself doing the left and right clicks.

Attire realisation

Being the ’new’ fashion designers that we were, we put our best foot foward towards making our idea reality.

After numerous trials and alterations, presentation day came quick and here is a video from the make-shift fashion show we had in D211, our learning studio. Second, is the video we broadcast in the background together with a music sound track and Nomad Couture branding.

After an exhilarating fashion show as our presentation, here was the feedback:

• Our design could have been realised more fully, probably if we had more time.
• The flyers were smart and helpful especially in this situation where we had no slides for presentation
• The sandles that Marty had on and the suede shoes I had on provided subtle but immense detail to our design.
• We could have been more careful with item placement and had better consideration for aesthetics.
• The introduction video and background music were impressive for starters that we were.
• We could have explored more ways of sparking conversation than cloth material.

Here were the key take-away points from the Survival of the Outfit project:

• Personal stories go a long way in inspiring our work since first hand information is probably the best information.
• We should always get along with our projects fast as there might never be enough time.
• It is sometimes helpful to spend more time on doing actual work than research.