Exploring Biomaterials in Textile Applications
This showcase features innovative plant and bacterial cellulose biomaterials, developed through extensive experimentation, demonstrating their durability, quality, and potential to replace unsustainable textiles. Large and small-scale samples, patterns, and moulds will reveal the material’s versatility, with real-life applications such as shoes and bags produced in collaboration with DESIGNwith’s skilled women sewists. Also presented will be a comparative life cycle analysis, highlighting the cost savings and significant environmental benefits of switching to biodegradable, circular materials. By starting with the end in mind – designing for the product’s “grave” as much as its “birth” – this work challenges conventional design processes, where sustainability is often an afterthought. The display, complemented by three zines on the circular economy and social innovation, invites a rethinking of how materials are made, used, and returned to the earth.
Participants
Ranee Lee, Becca Wakefield, Hannah Cormier, Jennifer An, Mary Getsen, Zach Menard, DESIGNwith interns, Regent Park women sewistsAcknowledgements
Accessibility
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