Central St Martins College of Art and Design
Central St Martins College of Art & Design offers a number of fashion-related courses covering ethical issues:
Students at CSM are actively encouraged to engage in debates around sustainability and this is embedded into curriculae. Engagement takes various forms and can be both formal and informal, technical, practical or conceptual. Students across the School develop a sense of responsibility for their design proposals and a significant number of final degree collections engage these principals, fundamental to the sustainable global growth of fashion, textiles and jewellery in the 21st Century.
Foundation
Undergraduate
(2008) Fashion, Textiles and Jewellery Degree courses at CSM all feature projects within the curriculum in which students are required to engage with a wide range of sustainable, ethical and ecologically responsible approaches to concept, design, material sourcing, manufacture and life cycle. Students also have the opportunity to engage with a variety of debates around sustainabiltiy within Contextual Studies, which offers a broad range of debates within an Environment Strand. Sustainability is an important strand within BA (hons) CCC (Criticism, Communication, Curation).
(2007) BA (hons) Fashion: Year 2 Sustainability project covers the human cost of fast fashion and labour standards and how designers' decisions can have an impact on workers and the environment. Many students endeavour to incorprate an ethical or environmental element into projects and final collections.
Contact: BA(hons) Fashion - Willie Walters <w.walters_at_csm.arts.ac.uk>
For other courses contact info(-at_)@csm.arts.ac.uk
Postgraduate
MA Design for Textiles Futures: Ethics and sustainability are core to the course philosophy. The course investigates key issues that will affect our future selves from a design point of view. New materials, new technologies and sustainable values related to textile design are the key focus of the curriculum.
Contact: Carole Collet <info_at_csm.arts.ac.uk>
Visit MA Design for Textiles Futures website.
(2008)
Research
The School of Fashion & Textiles has a Research Fellow specifically looking at ethical issues in clothing and textiles, whose remit includes engagement with students. It also maintains relationshps with a variety of institutions and projects relating education to development and sustainaility and the School actively encourages research studentships at PhD who wish to explore this area.
The School actively encourages research studentships at PhD who wish to explore this area.
Contact: Mo Tomaney <motomaney_at_aol.com>
See Mo's biography at the TFRG website
Short courses
Contemporary Textiles from Old - saturday course working with recycled textiles and garments.
This is a creative and stimulating workshop which breaks rules, inspires creativity and challenges the ‘norm'. Through deconstructing old garments and textiles students will produce several pieces of textile work and an exciting ideas sketchbook. This hands-on workshop is aimed at people who want a chance to experiment and ‘play' with different print techniques and textural processeses. (2008)
Contact: Sophie Gorton <sophie_at_sophiegorton.com>
Extra-curricular activities
(2007) Several students are working on a development project with women textile producers in rural districts of Pakistan as interns, learning about fair trade and co-operative principles and developing markets in this environment.
Contact: Willie Walters <w.walters_at_csm.arts.ac.uk>
Visit the Central St Martins website.
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