Gingham All You’ve Got
This project re-imagines the humble checked work shirt as a textile asset of multiple uses.
The title is both a nod to the universality of gingham, check & plaid and a critique on the urgent need to make use of what we have; to recognise our old textiles as robust materials we must actively care for, repair and re-value. Each piece is made out of decommissioned cotton shirts, one of my favourite mediums to work with as they are in and of themselves a perfect wearable system. Their silhouettes are universal and non-gendered, and they have a robust, versatile fibre structure that allows them to be endlessly remade. They are discarded in abundance and accessible by all.
This work was commissioned by The Australian Design Centre and exhibited in the Object Space Gallery, March 2021.
To construct the two lengths I disassembled approximately seven op-shopped shirts, breaking them down into a series of rectangles which I then sewed back together in a patched arrangement resembling the original checks and grids of the fabric. This new textile structure reexamines and recontextualises the original purpose of the shirting.
One of the pieces was left undyed and the other I dyed with naturally fermented indigo, a pigment that has long held a relationship with cotton workwear of the past. My intention in presenting the same cloth in two colourways is to illustrate that one of the easiest steps towards reviving our old textiles is by simply changing their colour. My goal is always using the least amount of intervention required to revalue and elevate an existing textile.
