At Rubbish to Runway, designers are promoting recycling and tackling waste in exciting and innovative ways.
Designers Giving Waste New Life
Today, sustainable fashion has gone mainstream with both large and small brands alike creating collections using recycled plastics or other synthetic materials. Re-Crafted, Re-Made, Upcycled and Recycled, are the buzzwords for fashion made from ‘deadstock’, (the leftovers from clothing manufacturing), reinvented garments, deconstructed then reconstructed, or disassembled and re-commercialised ready-made products which are created into something new, all of which have seen a recent boom and have become the latest in fashion trends.
Contemporary independent designers giving waste new life are increasingly on the radars of modern consumers who are concerned about environmental deterioration and pollution and resource shortages and value the idea of saving waste from landfill.
According to the United Nations we dump a massive 2.12 billion tons of waste every year worldwide, and a whopping 99 percent of the stuff we buy is thrown away within 6 months.
Rubbish to Runway
The designers at Rubbish to Runway (R2R) are all too aware that we make too much, buy too much and waste too much, and are following in the footsteps of some of the most innovative and exciting approaches to responsible design practice by turning one person’s trash into another’s treasure.
Rubbish to Runway originated in 2011 to support the sustainable San Juan Comalapa, Guatemala school campus founded by the charity Long Way Home (LWH).
Previously garments shown on the Rubbish to Runway catwalk have been made from innovative materials such as discarded party products, tape, wire, washers, plastic dairy product cartons, bird seed bags, old newspaper microcell film, plastic cutlery, bottle caps and jar lids to re-purposed shredded medical waste from an emergency room.
Last year, due to the pandemic, the annual Rubbish to Runway fashion show moved to a virtual event and was renamed The Rubbish to Runway 30-Day Resilience Challenge to acknowledge the challenges from the COVID-19 shutdowns.
The event raised over $6,000 in contributions and the money was used to cover a month of payroll for Long Way Home’s local staff in Comalapa, after the COVID-19 pandemic forced Long Way Home and their Hero School to shut down operations in mid-March 2020.
Long Way Home
Long Way Home, is a non-profit charity that uses sustainable construction to help build housing and schooling in Guatemala and is leading by example in demonstrating what can be achieved with civic participation and a will to make positive changes from the ground up. Long Way Home provides dynamic, place-based, and experiential educational opportunities to learn green-building design and construction methodologies.
It is Long Way Home’s mission to mobilize people to actively participate in democracy and create innovative pathways to economic and environmental justice, through green building, employment, and education, and their Hero School in in San Juan Comalapa, Guatemala has been designed and built by a community of more than 2,000 committed volunteers, staff and a local construction crew, and provides a vibrant, accessible, and democratic education to over a hundred children, increasing their critical thinking skills and thus their economic sustainability.
Built using green-building techniques and local materials, Hero School has transformed 450 tons of community waste and repurposed over 15,000 tires and serves as the learning hub for local and international students to reimagine the way we build and gain knowledge to become a new generation of innovators.
How to Support Rubbish to Runway & Long Way Home
This year local employment remains a top priority for the virtual-event R2R fundraiser and aims to help maintain the livelihoods of teachers and builders within San Juan Comalapa, Guatemala, ensuring that they can continue to provide for their families as we emerge from the global pandemic. New for this year’s event is the chance to win cash prizes of $1000, $500 or $250 by buying raffle tickets; the more tickets you buy, the bigger the discount and higher probability of winning, so don’t miss out! Get your raffle tickets here and help with supporting R2R and LWH.
Alternatively, you can also support Long Way Home by creating a fundraising profile and signing up to fundraise, which is done through their event page, powered by MobileCause. Signing up is super easy, just input your information into this form, and voila! There are also prizes for fundraisers and the more you fundraise, the higher your chances are of winning one of their incredible prizes, which include:
- A printed photograph by Guatemalan photojournalist Santiago Billy Prem.
Santiago has worked as a professional photographer and journalist since 2012 and started taking documentary photography at the age of 18 in La Antigua Guatemala. With a passion for rituals, religion and mysticism he launched a visual journalism project at the end of 2016, which is an online magazine that specialises on documenting some of the lesser-known and relevant cultural aspects and traditions of the tropical world. His work has been featured in articles from major news agencies such as Associated Press (AP), Agence France-Presse (AFP), the Spanish Agencia EFE and Getty. He recently documented the tragedy of the Fuego volcano and the caravans of Central American migrants. You can check out Santiago’s work on Instagram here. Currently his work is in transition from digital to medium and large format film.
- A one-of-a kind piece by international fashion designer Isabella Springmühl.
Isabella Springmühl (Belita) is the world’s first fashion designer with Down Syndrome and her artistic and vibrant designs are influenced by Guatemalan folklore and the numerous indigenous Guatemalan artists who she has worked with. She makes accessories, wallets, ponchos and dresses, inspired by the culture of her country with colourful floral embroidery using old Guatemalan textiles.
Isabella first became interested in fashion because it was difficult to find clothes that fitted her, as her body shape is different. Her mother always needed to adjust her clothes and so she decided to become a fashion designer, with the intention to make clothing designed especially for people with her condition.
With no formal training or education in fashion, Isabella taught herself to cut and sew patterns and then created her own brand called “Down to Xjabelle”: Down because of her condition; Xjabelle after the atelier her maternal grandmother Blanca de Tejada, had 37 years ago, who also used Guatemalan textiles in her designs. Her love for the colourful and strong cultural traditions of Guatemalan textiles have inspired Isabella to create truly one-of-a-kind pieces.
In 2015, Isabella was invited to showcase her work at “Guatextraordinaria”, held at the Ixchel Museum of Indigenous Textiles and Clothing in Guatemala.
The show was a great success, and she sold out of her collection. She has since grown in popularity, and her designs have been showcased in Panama, Rome and at the International Fashion Showcase segment of London Fashion Week in 2016, with the title “Utopia 2016, a year of imagination and possibility”.
The same year Isabella was voted one of the BBC’s 100 Most Influential Women, a multi-format television series established in 2013 examining the role of women in the 21st century, for her contribution to fashion and work, despite her condition.
Isabella will also be participating in this year’s Rubbish to Runway event as a designer. You can check out her work on Instagram here.
the rubbish to runway 2021 virtual event
Isabella will also be participating in this year’s Rubbish to Runway event as a designer. You can check out her work on Instagram here.
This year you can also attend the Rubbish to Runway virtual event on12 September 2021 at 3.00 PM GMT / 5:00 PM EDT and join Isabella and a host of incredibly talented designers from Guatemala, United States, El Salvador, Colombia and around the globe who are participating in the event. The event is a chance for designers and supporters to showcase wearable art constructed from post-consumer waste materials. The purpose of the show is to advocate for recycling, reuse, and up-cycling as socially conscientious choices. To support this year’s Rubbish to Runway you can purchase a ticket to the event here. Tickets are pay what you can, as the event aims to be as inclusive for everyone as possible.
If you are unable to attend the runway event, you can still support Long Way Home by sharing this event and inviting your friends and family to support Long Way Home too, as they need all the support they can get to reach their goal, and continue to support their amazing teachers and administration who have worked so incredibly hard through the recent tough times.
For more information visit Long Way Home or alternatively, find them on Instagram here.