Held in January, the event in Hong Kong challenged emerging designers to create fashion pieces with sustainable materials used in Ford vehicles and textile waste.
The design challenge was organised by Ford Motor Company in collaboration with sustainable fashion charity organisation Redress with the purpose of highlighting the importance and impact of adopting sustainable design thinking and materials in the fashion and automotive industries.
The collection of garments created from Ford recycled seat fabrics at the Redress Forum: Ford Design Challenge.
At the design challenge, 10 emerging designers from Hong Kong, mainland China, Taiwan, Malaysia, Singapore, United Kingdom, France, Sweden and Denmark transformed sustainable seat fabrics from Ford vehicles into a couture design.
This was done through the creative process of ‘up-cycling’, which converts wasted and abandoned materials into something new and of higher quality.
The 10 designers taking part were The EcoChic Design Award 2014/15 finalists.
The winning piece, created entirely from an earthy color palette of Ford seat fabrics by the designers, was inspired by the bamboo scaffolding at the Hong Kong Legislative Council.
“We scored the foam on the reverse side of the seat fabric, revealing colour and texture reminiscent of the stone walls of the legislature,” said Andersson.
The award winning, architecturally inspired outfit was handcrafted in three hours.
Emily Lai, manager, Color and Materials Design, Ford Asia Pacific said, “We would like to congratulate these budding designers for successfully rising to this challenging task of creating fashion out of a technical material like car seat fabric.”
“The opportunity to work with recycled seat fabrics was an exciting experience. I never expected plastic bottles could be transformed into appealing materials and eventually into such an unexpected garment,” said Lee, a recent graduate in fashion design from the Raffles Design Institute in Singapore.
Ford’s sponsorship of The EcoChic Design Award 2014/15 is in line with the company’s long-standing and growing commitment to sustainability.
