While environmentalists and retailers are debating the use and reuse of plastic shopping bags Fashion and Textile Design students at the University of Technology, Sydney are turning them into wedding dresses.

The second year Fashion and Textile students recently finished a course on sustainability, looking at how they could improve their designs and make the fashion industry more environmentally friendly at the same time.

Lecturer Kirsty Máté, Managing Director of Eco Balance Sustainable Design, said the students were asked to create a design solution by either making their product organic, and therefore safely biodegradable, or made from recycled or reused materials.

"Some of the solutions and designs were highly innovative and showed how the fashion industry could possibly develop into the future," Ms Máté said.

They included:

• textiles made from vegetables, dog hair and even human hair
• accessories made from dried pumpkins
• a wedding dress and beach gear made entirely from recycled plastic shopping bags
• reusable, changeable and adjustable garments - designed to suit changing fashions, looks and sizes - made from textile offcuts and old garments
• a bikini made entirely from rubber rings
• accessories made from recycled electrical wire
  

"The plastic wedding dress comes apart to make an evening gown and the rubber bikini is made from industrial rubber rings that were disposed of at recycling cooperative Reverse Garbage," Ms Máté said.

Tuesday 10 December 2002