Clothing sustainability and upcycling in Ghana
- Submitting institution
-
Nottingham Trent University
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- 6R - 1196347
- Type
- D - Journal article
- DOI
-
10.1080/17569370.2019.1661601
- Title of journal
- Fashion Practice
- Article number
- -
- First page
- 375
- Volume
- 11
- Issue
- 3
- ISSN
- 1756-9370
- Open access status
- Compliant
- Month of publication
- August
- Year of publication
- 2019
- URL
-
-
- Supplementary information
-
-
- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
-
1
- Research group(s)
-
C - Fashion and Textiles Research Centre
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- Yes
- Additional information
- The research developed from preliminary visits to Ghana by A. St.John-James, in order to develop research into design practices for sustainability in a developing country. The aim of the research is to assess opportunities for the upcycling of waste clothing by design. Significant amounts of waste clothing from the developed world and large producer nations, including the UK are sold to the markets in Ghana (and to many other parts of Africa). Upcycling examines how garments can be re-designed and resold at a higher value.
The primary research was conducted through fieldwork and a design workshop in 2017 with five groups of fashion design students at Accra Technical University, where St.John-James had taught for eight years. A participatory research design was applied to the project, in which each group defined a design theme, made a selection of clothes and accessories in the Accra market and returned to the university to conceptualise and re-create clothes and accessories. The project addressed the disposal stage of the circular economy model of clothing sustainability and provided new knowledge of the effect of waste clothing in the developing world on its economy and the stages in the process of re-design of waste for new garments and accessories.
The research was first presented at the peer-reviewed Global Fashion Conference (London College of Fashion 2018) and was subsequently revised for a special edition attached to the conference in 2019. It informed the start-up of a new African fashion training centre in Accra (licenced in 2019) and a sustainable fashion design partnership which is being negotiated with Kwame Nkrumah University at Kumasi, Ghana. A new PhD student from Ghana is planned to start her studies in 2020-21, which will expand the impact and development of this project.
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -