Lux Perpetua: Future Pioneers Utilizing Historical Precedent as Design Innovation Within Fashion

Abstract

Could the future of fashion be found in the past? As a result of the cumulative negative effects of over-consumption of fashion globally and the commensurate resource depletion this requires, as well as the sometimes catastrophic impacts on the laborers who make them, the accelerated pace of current fast fashion systems are now fundamentally unsustainable. There are however fashion producers who are putting sustainability at the forefront of their entrepreneurial ambitions and are focusing their formidable creative energies and expertise into incorporating re-use principles deeply into their design ethos, and developing no-harm, no-waste production models. Eileen Fisher and friends of light are both New York based garment manufacturers who are pioneering techniques that are in fact grounded within historical traditions: re-making garments and weaving to form respectively. This essay includes a description of the processes of these innovative design practitioners that was derived from site visits, and interviews with principles in both organizations and also includes a contextualization of the historical and philosophical antecedents of their respective operations. It also looks at the communication encoded in alternative paradigms of fashion production.

Keywords:

• fashion sustainability
• zero-waste fashion
• ethical fashion
• artisanal weaving
• Eileen Fisher

Acknowledgments

A heartfelt thank you to Mae Colburn and the f o l collective, to Carmen Gama and Eileen Fisher, to Timo Rissanen, Lu Ann Lafrenz, my mum and New York family, the editors of this journal, and special thanks to the peer reviewers for their thoughtful and very useful feedback.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mark O’Connell

Mark O’Connell holds his BA from OCADU and an MA Fashion at Ryerson University, where he completed a Major Research Project entitled “Moral Fibre: Integrating Ethics and Sustainability into Fashion Curriculum” (June 2016). Mark O’Connell is a professor of fashion studies at Seneca College, Toronto, Canada. His chapter “Clandestina: An Ethnographic Study of Economic Policy and Colonial Hegemonies Encoded in the Consumption of Used Garments” will be included in the forthcoming publication Ethical Fashion and Empowerment (McGill University Press 2020). Prior to teaching, Mark worked as a designer both in-house at M.A.C Cosmetics and for his own clothing line, Modular Menswear. Mark is also concurrently pursuing a PhD in Politics and Policy within the Communication and Culture faculty offered jointly at Ryerson University and York University. His research explores the potential for social justice reforms in transnational fashion production and supply chains. [email protected]