Payne’s essay confirmed a lot of the material that I researched and read about in preparation for our topic presentation on textiles. However, I did learn a few new things:
- Since Australia is in the Southern Hemisphere, they have “been traditionally a fashion season behind Europe and the US” enabling Australian designs to “knock off” products from Gap, Zara, and Topshop (Pg. 6)
- Payne calls this a “process of sourcing and product development” instead of design, which I entirely agree with.
- Garment use in Australia suffers from large amounts of waste: “The Wasteful Consumption report found that an estimated AUD1.56 billion per annum is spent on clothing, accessories and personal products which are never worn or worn only once (Hamilton, Denniss and Baker 2005).” (Pg. 10)
- I was surprised by the amount of money that was spent on things that were never used. This is incredibly upsetting and I agree with Payne that the industry should find ways to “encourage consumers to develop deeper relationships with their clothing” (Pg. 9)
- Nano-technology can be used to repel odor: “Australian workwear label King Gee has utilised nano- technology at a fibre level to repel odour, enabling the garment to be less intensively laundered (Stead 2010)” (Pg. 9) But, the long-term effects of disposing of such enhanced materials are unknown.
- This kind of innovation is very exciting. I believe that going into fashion design today requires a more in-depth understanding of the entire life-cycle of a piece as well as a desire to innovate using new techniques and technologies.
I also liked that Payne emphasized the challenge that designers face: they might have a great idea, but oftentimes budget limitations impact their designs. This is applicable throughout various industries. I myself have been faced with this challenge. For example, a UX designer cannot merely think about how to make the product useful and usable, but they also have to take into account the goals of the business, clients, internal stakeholders, and technical feasibility.
Understanding the entire life-cycle of a product as well as making ethical design choices is becoming all the more important for all kinds of designs. I am happy to see that more and more people seem to be concerned with creating change in the fashion industry.