Sustainable Fetishwear (work safe)

Difficulty:

Category: Sewing

Type of item: Clothing

For: Women

Style: Eco-Friendly

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Materials

This project was a deconstruct/reconstruct sustainability adventure so I started with a children's raincoat and an old kilt of my own and used 100 percent of the fabric to construct multiple pieces. I even used all of the original thread in order to stuff the Minnie style ears and head bow :) The only things I added were boning, rivets, a headband, and new thread to sew with!

What was your inspiration?

For studio class in the winter we had to create a sustainable garment out of vintage or second hand garments. The goal was to use 100% of the materials to create an upcycled clothing piece. I knew I needed to do something that directly spoke to my own aesthetic. This led me to conceptualizing the idea of using unsustainable fabrics to design fetishwear! The fabrics used to create fetishwear are typically quite bad for the environment and the idea of 'sustainability'.

Over 33 million of tons of PVC is produced annually and it emits toxic compounds from manufacture to disposal. The shiny lovely durability it boasts is unfortunately also its downfall-> It is not biodegradable or degradable, which means all the PVC that gets dumped in landfills either just sits there for decades.. Or it is burned and releases toxic fumes like hydrogren chloride gas and dioxin :/ I knew I wanted to use PVC garments for this project for just this reason.

My first order of business was to find some interesting PVC material and I immediately thought of children's raincoats. They had fun patterns and didn't have excessive amounts of material or lining! I picked up three coats and opted for this Mickey Mouse version because it reminded me of my childhood adventures in Disneyland :) From there I also knew I wanted to make a corset so I found a kilt in my closet that I didn't mind parting with that would work for the lining.

What are you most proud of?

It was a huge amount of work but I was very happy with what I produced. I started with 651.5 grams of fabric from my garments which included the weights of all extra embellishments that were needed, such as the boning and eyelets. And *drumroll* I ended up being able to use 100% of the original garments! I even saved the thread from the original constructions.. I swear, there was method to my madness! lol The fruits of my labor are posted below. I constructed an underbust corset, Minnie ears, a pair of spats, a purse, and a little neck tie :)

What advice would you give someone starting this project?

I meticulously followed my process during this adventure so if you are interested in doing something similar the blog post is here: http://smashworks.blogspot.com/2011/04/studio-deconstructreconstruct.html#more