Fashion Revolution Week Inspires Mending Workshop

April 19-25, 2021, is Fashion Revolution Week!

Fashion Revolution Week empowers the fashion industry to become more eco-centric and transparent about human rights violations that go on within the industry.

What inspired Fashion Revolution Week?

The April 24, 2013, collapse of the Rana Plaza in Bangladesh inspired the week-long event. At the time, the structure housed several garment factories that employed around 5,000 people.

When the Rana Plaza collapsed, the people in this building were manufacturing clothing for several major fashion labels. More than 1,100 people were killed, and another 2,500 were injured, making it the fourth largest industrial disaster in history. 

The majority of the victims were young women.

What are the goals of Fashion Revolution Week?

• To challenge the fashion industry to become more environmentally conscious and human rights-oriented.
• To inspire the fashion industry to halt the practices of discrimination and inequality within their ranks.
• To motivate suppliers worldwide to upgrade and maintain the safety standards of the structures in which their employees work.
• To hold members of the fashion industry who ignore environmental and human rights-oriented violations more accountable for their actions.

How can I get involved in Fashion Revolution Week?

• Post something supporting the initiative's ideas on your social media pages and include the hashtag, #whomademyclothes? 
• Contact the corporate office of a brand of clothing you like, inquire where the garments they sell are made and if they know what kind of conditions under which the people who make those clothes work.
• Write your elected representatives and encourage them to create and uphold laws that protect garment workers' rights in the United States.

Do you see a future for yourself in the fashion industry?

Is your dream to become the next Calvin Klein and start your own clothing line? Or would you rather become a retail merchandiser and predict trends for a major department store like Target?

If either of these scenarios appeals to you, then you should consider enrolling in Hocking College's Fashion Design and Retail Merchandising program. 

Since Autumn 2020, this program has provided students with a unique two-year pathway geared to help them successfully enter the fashion and retail markets. 

In keeping with the spirit of Fashion Revolution Week, Program Manager Coral Wedel is "incorporating the principles of sustainability, transparency and ethics in the fashion industry into the entire program."

"We are actively reusing, recycling and reducing our waste stream," she said. "Fabric and drafting paper scraps are kept for reuse as well as recycled when unable to be reused. Sustainability is a factor in our supply chain choices, for instance, through the purchase of deadstock fabric and trims."

Students in Wedel's program are also versed in how transparency and ethics relate to business practices throughout the entire curriculum. 

Her goal is to encourage students to learn about the way things are done and explore how things can be done to be forward-thinking innovators in the fashion industry. 

In conjunction, Wedel's students will be conducting a Mending Workshop on Thursday, April 22, from 2-4 p.m. in John Light Hall, Room 363. The workshop is free and open to Hocking College faculty, staff and students.

Three of Wedel's students will set up stations, each of which will offer a different service.

Student Lauren Parrish's station will involve making T-shirt bags. She plans to offer a choice between two types of bags made from reused T-shirts.

"One will be tied at the bottom for a no-sew option, and the other will be sewn," she said. "I am creating tags with my name and a message to attach to the bags so by the end of the workshop they will be up for grabs."

Parrish will also be creating small cards with instructions if anyone who attends this workshop wants to try and make a T-shirt bag on their own. 

As for her choice of a project, Parrish said, "Reusable bags are becoming popular, and I found that I have an excess of T-shirts I will not be wearing anymore, so I am excited! It's a super easy craft that can make you feel better about helping the environment!"

Fellow students Jazmin Cruz and Tony Pope will run the other stations at the workshop: a hemming and repair station and a fashion and social media station.

Cruz recommends this program primarily for the hands-on training she's received under Wedel's guidance.

"I enrolled in this program because I have always been passionate about having a career in fashion," Cruz said. "I believe that this program will get me there!"

For more information on the Mending Workshop or Hocking College's Fashion Design and Retail Merchandising program, contact Program Manager Coral Wedel by email at wedelc@hocking.edu or by phone at 740-753-6425.