'Flourish'

This garment is one that I've made for a design class at university recently. I have to present it on Friday, so I got it all finished and photographed today! :)

The fake grass bustier-piece represents moss... if time permitted my design would have had a bustier made of rubber and lined with cotton with moss cultivated onto it (however moss takes months to grow, so that was slightly impossible...). My aim in creating this concept garment was to design a piece of clothing that is less wasteful than the current norm in the fashion world. If a person wears an item of clothing many times they may tire of it, and then dispose of it. By having a dress that has living, growing embellishments, it enables a single garment to change and show many different looks.

The rest of the garment also reflects my original idea behind this project, which was exploring the relationship between humanity and nature. Other aspects of the garment are made from artificial elements that hark back to nature... voluminous tulle and organza is reminiscent of a shrub branching out, and artificial flowers capture the beauty of real blossoms. Dressing a figure in this medley of influences drawn from nature represents the close, side-by-side existence of humanity and the natural world.