Open Source Fashion Cookbook: Next Level Home Sewing
First I will start out quoting the project’s description on the back cover since it is the perfect succinct definition of what this project is all about. There is a lot here.
“The Open Source Fashion Cookbook is designed to democratize sustainable and ethical fashion, enabling all people - especially communities that cannot traditionally afford to shop from responsible brands - to participate in responsible consumption. With detailed “recipes,” including step-by-step illustrations from six contemporary fashion brands, the Cookbook empowers you to make your home. We understand that not everyone is a trained sewer, so we included recipes that vary in difficulity, from no-sew easy basics to more advanced designs.”
Produced by the founders of the clothing company ADIFF, Angeles Luna and Loulwa Al Saad in their “Cookbook” lay out an approach to survivalist fashion for the 21st century that incorporates all the elements - modularity, upcycling, zero waste, documentation, housing, migration (dislocation), open source access - a conversation that I can tell you we were not having at FIT in the mid 90’s when I was a student. Today, as so many talk about sustainability in fashion (and home sewing), just talk to make money or to attract followers, these designers give you a program to follow that is accessible to everyone with the vision to create real change via dress. Even if the designs aren’t “for you,” their approach can inspire just about anyone who can thread a needle - to think about the relationship between dress and climate change as an active participant. If you are frustrated in out how to define a personal sewing practice that is based on true sustainability - I highly recommend you check out this project. Their approach to sustainable fashion envisions a fast approaching future where the majority of the world’s human population may be somehow displaced or un-housed - whether we want to acknowledge it or not this reality is in the public consciousness. Not one day passes where I am not in some capacity confronted with these issues on the street, in the news, in my backyard (fires), in my own volunteer work. Bravo to these designers for bringing it home!
The book is structured in 3 sections, first a series of essays, then tools and materials, along with instructions for the open source patterns that are to be downloaded online. Of particular note, which summarizes for me the spirit of this project, is in one essay by Timo Rissanen, who invokes the term “‘unreasonable imagination’ as a key strategy for our time. In most Western cultures we don’t appreciate the human imagination as an asset. Yet it is our imagination that offers us a chance to build our way out of multiple crisis that we as humanity, including those of us in fashion, find ourselves in” (9). This book is definitely worth the investment and left me with a renewed sense of optimism that I hope the home sewing community will embrace soon (now)!
Book can be purchased directly from ADIFF here
I will be working on sourcing some of the materials like the hardware and webbing from deadstock and recycled plastic. Fingers crossed.
