Various crucial aspects have grown more important in today’s fashion industry. What are clothes made of? How, where and by whom are they produced? And how can they be disposed? These questions pertain to the design and making of textiles and clothes, as well as to the position and role of crafts in the overall production process. The research project on Recrafting Craft concentrates on the interactions between fashion and advanced fashion education. Where these two worlds intersect, various ongoing changes in the notions of crafts and craftsmanship arise.

The main objective of this research project is to re-tailor the meaning of craft as an essential vehicle for fashion education. As such this project is based on the vision that experimenting with new materials, sustainable textiles and digital production is necessary to create innovative designs and new business models. The argument presented proposes an answer to the question: how can traditional and future crafts be merged and create synergy in fashion workshops and fashion curricula at art schools in the Netherlands, in order to give fashion students new professional perspectives to adapt to changes within the global fashion industry?

Key to this is an analysis of a broken fashion system and a close examination of fashion design workshops as an exemplary educational model. Attention is also paid to a special education project, organized together with Waag Society, aimed at closing the gap between education and industry. Starting from notions and ideas developed by sociologist Richard Sennett, trend forecaster Lidewij Edelkoort, fashion professor José Teunissen, and various experts and students in a newly formulated stakeholders’ network, this research develops a framework for open-ended exploration and collective discussion of the issues involved. Special attention is given to practices at the Royal Academy of Art (The Hague) and Central Saint Martins (London). Regarding students as agents for change, Recrafting Craft argues for a synergy of crafts within fashion workshops of the future, while also presenting a set of prospective scenarios.

External Critic: Dr. Oscar Tomico (Eindhoven University of Technology, assistant professor of Designing Quality in Interaction Research Group)

Photography: Jimena Gauna for Waag Society (2016)
Photography of the graduation show: Aad Hoogendoorn.

– First prize of the ‘WdKA Research Award 2016’
– Nomination ‘Max van der Kamp Thesis Prize 2017’ by National Centre of Expertise for Cultural Education and Amateur Arts (LKCA)