The project experiments with methods of teaching fashion practice in ways that move fashion education outside of an isolated discipline into spaces that move and bridge between economics, politics, ecologies, anthropology, sociology, embodiments.

The central method is the process of unpicking unworn denim garments, selected due to the complex nature of the garment construction, and thus the extended time denim takes to undo.
The time taken on the process of unpicking works as a metaphor for unpicking of the fashion system, and conversations are prompted by adding readings and visual materials in with the unpicking.

The unpicked garments are then reconnected into forms negotiated by the group, pushing further the time spent with the same material, with each other, without individual design ideas. We reflect on not only the fashion system, or its materials, but the prevalent understandings of fashion practice, our roles as designers and the embodiment effects of making and wearing fashion.

The project has been documented in a publication - a series of 50 handprinted copies, that capture and reflect six years of the collective learning project.

Each of the 50 publications includes 4 inserts (as detailed below) as well as: a 2 colour risograph printed cover, a badge hand-made from cyanotypes of textiles, a wrap-round binding to hold all the elements together each numbered by hand.

Insert 1 – 56 pages of images from the workshop Fashion Constellations Gathering 2019. It documents each collective textile that was made during the project, the conversations that happened during the day, experiments in making a collective template with cyanotype, as well as writing from graduated students that reflected on the teaching project.

Insert 2 – 32 pages documenting the exhibition Fashion Constellations 2020 at The Constance Howard Gallery and Textile Collection. The exhibition was space to a further workshop with external practitioners and other staff members. We also hosted a podcast conversation between Katherine and Ruby from the gallery space with Kinship Podcasts.

Insert 3 – Notes of Fashion Constellations 2021, a reflective piece of writing

Insert 4 – an A4 double sided poster, risograph printed.

https://research.gold.ac.uk/id/eprint/35490