Julia Lumsdens Masters: A garment for the upper body with a collar and sleeves and buttons down the front

Juila Lumdens masters on the challenge of zero waste via a shirt is truly inspiring. Because the concept is relatively new in modern fashion, reading something that makes sense and connects with my own thinking is quite exciting. These are some notes I made from the report:

- Creating garments with creating fabric waste: Research into modern practices and cutting techniques has shown that on average 15% of the fabric used to create garments is wasted. Approx 50% of the cost of producing a garment comes from fabric so getting a high yield out of that fabric is of great benefit to the manufacturer. For Juila, her love and expertise in pattern making are cohesive with her interest in zero waste as she finds it easier/more beneficial to plan a pattern that will represent a design rather than a sketch. The desire to make garments without waste is not new. The square cut Kimono or Sari are just a couple of examples where zero waste have been used in history.
- Julia prefers to work on the fold as this gives the garment a more symmetrical appearance and aesthetic. Even when she didn't work on the fold she found her patterns were more of less symmetrical so through working on the fold it makes the whole concept more accurate and tidy. "By conceding to the design process I found that through construction, the patterns could work with corresponding seams of different lengths if I were flexible about the way the garments were constructed and finished... Where possible, I endeavored to keep the same seam lengths but also attempted to forgo the perceived notions of pattern making for the purpose of experiment.
- "The design process continued into the finishing of the jackets, where essentially the whole outside edges of the jackets were bound and then the front edges were folded back and stitched in various ways to create facings and lapels that highlighted the different style elements of the jackets."

(Lumsden, 2010)

Lumsden, J. (2010). A garment for the upper body with a collar . Wellington : Massey University .