Meet GFF Talent, Anna Watson from Heriot-Watt University. Anna’s final year project is a high-end sustainable womenswear collection, that she designed to take busy people from the office to the evening. Using modular elements, reversibility and innovative pattern cutting, Anna’s work is aesthetically inspired by French history and the parallels between revolutions of the past and the various social justice movements that occurred in 2020, when she was ideating the collection. Read on to learn more about Anna’s work and sustainable fashion ethos.
What is the most valuable thing you have learnt at university?
I have worked extremely hard throughout my studies but the most important thing that I’ve learnt so far is to take time off regularly. There have been lots of periods of stress and deadlines when I’ve felt I didn’t have time to relax even for a moment, but I now know that working like that is counter-productive and can have negative effects on my mental and even physical health. Since the first lockdown, I’ve finally started going for long walks at the weekends with my flatmate. This gives me time to step back from my work and I’ve found that I always end up thinking of new ideas or solving little problems in my head when I take this time out. By the time Sunday night comes around, I find myself excited to go back to work and I have newfound inspiration to take into the next week.
During the week, I’ve also found that smaller walks in the evening can help to clear my mind of work before I start to relax and I’ve even been taking a full hour’s lunch break whenever I can. These lockdowns have had very negative effects on everyone’s mental health but the silver lining for me is that they’ve helped me to see that looking after myself is important. I now appreciate little things like a couple more minutes of sunlight each day or bumping into friends in town and getting two minutes to chat about our lives. Whereas before, I made my uni work my entire life, I’ve learnt to relax and step back when I can in order to create better work inspired by my experiences. This revelation couldn’t have come at a better time as I don’t think I could have coped in the fourth year at the pace I was going at before.
What was the starting point of inspiration for your final project?
I’ve been interested in French history ever since I moved to Paris for a year at 17 and enrolled in art history classes. I was fascinated by how the art movements were shaped by periods of political unrest and they each captured the feeling of the time. I was talking to my brother (who has an encyclopaedic knowledge of just about everything) last summer about little-known sub-cultures and he Mentioned Les Incroyables et Merveilleuses so I decided to look further into the subject. During summer 2020, there was also deep political unrest due to lockdown restrictions and the Black lives matter movement, and it was easy to see huge parallels between this and the revolutionary period in France. The Incroyables et Merveilleuses were aristocracy who had survived the first revolution and mocked the executions by throwing extravagant parties and wearing a very particular style of luxurious clothing.
I thought about how we seemed to be on the brink of a revolution too and wondered what a modern post-revolutionary uniform might look like. At the same time, my Mum had been travelling in a camper van in Argentina on her ‘grown-up gap year’ and ended up stranded there waiting for a repatriation flight. In such a scary time, I was missing her more than ever and clung to the hand-me-down clothing she had given me (which makes up a huge chunk of my wardrobe). I started to consider the deep connection we feel to certain garments and how this can cause positive sustainable behaviours such as mending, careful laundering and replacement of parts. This led me into a flurry of academic research into transitional objects such as baby blankets and caused me to consider how this kind of garment narrative could be built into the clothing I design. How could I create clothing so special that the wearer chose to keep it in the family for generations?
What form will your final project take?
The outcome of this project will be a collection of 6 outfits, with 2 of them in final physical form. It is a high-end sustainable womenswear collection designed to take busy people from office to evening and is designed using modular elements, reversibility and innovative pattern cutting. The patterns were produced without any blocks, using draping and fabric manipulation to create unique and fun silhouettes. Of the 6 garments which I will manufacture, 5 are fully reversible, one has a detachable skirt that can be worn separately, and one long jacket can be buttoned up to create a cropped version. All of the items are adjustable in length, waist size or strap tightness, allowing for great fitting and fluctuation in weight. Reversible items have different patterns or colours on each side, which means that they can be more with different outfits.
Versatility was extremely important to me when I was designing this collection as I wanted to make it as accessible as possible for a luxury market. A huge amount of academic research taught me that luxury fashion was the best option in terms of sustainability, but I was worried that only a small percentage of the population would be able to buy into this idea. To counter this, I decided that each piece would have to be suitable for many occasions and be able to be mixed and matched with an existing wardrobe, to reduce the need to buy multiple garments. I also found in my research that there was a huge gap in the UK market for luxury reselling, and proposed an overarching second-hand network that would hold brands accountable for the post-purchase behaviour of their customers. This network would provide resale prices for items at the time of purchase, to give consumers a clearer understanding of the investment value of their purchases and encourage transparency.
What materials have you used and how did you source them?
A lot of thought and research went into each of the materials for this collection to ensure that they were long-lasting and low impact. Fabrics are natural and mostly organic, sourced from my favourite online fabric shops which I’ve discovered throughout my four years at university. The red crocheted fabric is reclaimed second-hand baby blankets, which I dyed myself as I couldn’t find quite the right colour. By using the baby blankets, I hope to give meaning to the new garments, as the special bond between child and blanket can be transferred into something new. The fastenings are mostly second hand, and the mismatched red buttons add a nice quirky feel to the garments. The only new fastening used is the organic cotton cord for the drawstrings, which I also dyed red to match the blankets.
Originally, I had designed a sublimation print inspired by the bright, optimistic colours and shapes of Andre Derain’s pre-war paintings as one of the main aesthetic features of the collection but with further restrictions this year, I was unable to go into my campus and print the fabric. I knew that I had to have this print anyway, and when my flatmate suggested potato prints I thought he was joking. However, after hours of research into the method, I found that it is a very sustainable way to create repeat patterns and I loved the imperfect effect that it produced. I bought a baking potato and started to experiment with different carving tools: kitchen knives, spoons, pencils and crochet hooks. After a few samples and trial runs I perfected my print and found a beautiful organic cotton voile to use. It took 16 hours and caused a lot of back pain, but I hand printed all 17 metres of the fabric with two baking potatoes!
How has it evolved from your initial ideas and what have you learnt along the way?
I started this project off with a strong idea of concept and mood but no idea how it would turn out aesthetically. It was very difficult to be creative this year when I couldn’t see my peers’ work and had limited access to materials and equipment but this forced me to become more innovative with my experimentation and I ended up producing some draped shapes which were very interesting. I used fabric scraps to sample puffed spheres that mimicked the beaded necklaces of the Incroyables et Merveilleuses. I was mostly working on a small scale because I couldn’t spend too much money on toiling fabrics, but this forced me to reuse and adapt my samples rather than starting each one from scratch, reducing waste.
I quickly came up with an initial line-up based on my research as I had an early deadline for this, but I wasn’t at all happy with what I had produced as it was very simple, and my supervisor agreed. At this point, the lockdown was really getting to me and I was feeling very downhearted but I decided to go back to my research and carefully pick out the areas which really excited me and develop them further. After this, I redesigned the full line up in a more free-spirited way, sketching down lots of ideas without thinking too much about how they would work at first. I then went in and chose the best ideas to develop further and consider manufacture and details for. This gave me a much more creative collection and I learnt that it’s ok to go back to the start if you’re not happy with the outcome. Although it was more work, it made such a difference in the long run as I was more motivated to produce work that I found aesthetically pleasing.
What are the messages and themes behind your project that you want people to take away? Do explore any topics like diversity, sustainability or politics in your work?
The main themes which I explored when designing Costume a la Victime are sustainability, democratisation and garment narrative. I explored these themes in various ways, by carefully considering every aspect of my manufacture and materials and thinking about the deeper meaning I wanted to build into my work. I was very engrossed in the academic writing behind these topics, and how they all intertwine and influence each other. I spent months figuring out the exact market I wanted to design for and how I could improve on its existing products. I decided to design for the luxury market but make my price points slightly lower than what was already on the market, as low as I could reasonably go taking into account the expensive organic fabrics used and paying theoretical workers fair wages.
The garments are objectively expensive, so I looked at alternative buying methods to allow more people access to high-quality clothing and I even included QR codes on my swing tags which lead to garment care and mending website to help wearers extend the lives of their clothes. On this site, there are pre-filmed mending tutorials and links to social media accounts with live question and answer sessions and workshops. I also found that more affordable clothing was often badly designed in terms of fit and style, making it less likely to be cherished and looked after. As fast fashion is produced so quickly, there is no time to make creative and fun garments, which are very much needed just now – so I did just that. I felt that even after designing this collection, I still had more to give to this topic, so I created a proposal for a community garment library that would allow people in small towns to rent and share exciting clothing, giving more people access to good quality luxury items. I figured out the funding, branding and full system for this proposal and would love to implement it in the village I grew up in one day.
What’s an aspect of the fashion industry that you’re passionate about fixing or having a positive impact on?
I see so many problems in the fashion industry which are caused by poor supply chain management and lack of transparency and I would love to be able to contribute positively to this. A lot of big brands claim to be ethical by changing small factors such as fabric compositions without considering the design and manufacture process as a whole. When consumers are unaware of the whole story, they are likely to believe this green-washing and buy into brands that exploit their workers and produce disposable and meaningless clothing. I think that a lot of the people high up in fashion brands are set in the ways they manage their companies and even when new talent is brought in at lower levels, it can only lead to superficial change for the sake of brand image. Because of this, I believe in the future of small brands who only create what they can handle and have full control of their processes.
The main issue here is that a few parent companies own most of the big brands and there is a struggle for control which can slow positive change. I would love to see smaller brands promoted more and have the platform to speak up about the negative side of the fashion industry. Fast fashion brands use their huge marketing budgets to pay for social influencer sponsorships, a very effective form of marketing that contributes to high sales of cheap clothing. I would like smaller brands to learn from this and use influencers to promote mending, resale and sustainable fashion, but at the moment, few have the budget for this. There is an opportunity for a collective or charity to fund such marketing and break the cycle of big brand monopoly, leading to less waste, fairer working conditions and better-designed clothing for all.
What is your plan once you finish your BA?
My dream would be to work for a small sustainable fashion brand in London or New York as an assistant designer. There are a few brands I love and would love to work for someday, so I keep up to date with their work and contact them regularly to enquire about jobs and internships. Unfortunately, for now, international travel is not on the cards and even in London it’s very difficult to find design work but I am extremely persistent so I’m hoping for the best. I’ve interned for four companies so far and the experiences I’ve enjoyed the most have definitely been the smaller businesses who have full control over their design processes and manufacture in-house.
I loved every minute of these internships and learnt so much about commercial manufacture and the everyday running of small businesses. I wouldn’t want to set up my own brand as I’ve seen first-hand how much time is spent on the everyday running of the business, with not much time to design. The companies I love most are those who really consider garment narrative and give back to the communities who are involved in their manufacturing processes. To be able to give some of the knowledge I’ve gained in my time at university to these companies would be great as I have a lot of ideas in terms of hand-me-down networks, transparent solutions and sustainable manufacturing which I would love to see brought to life. Unfortunately, I wouldn’t be able to afford to move to London without a paid job offer, so I may have to move back in with my parents while I’m still job hunting. In the meantime, I think it’s essential to stay creative even if it means interning remotely for free again or even selling some of my garments online.