(from left) Dr Joe Au, Associate Dean of SFT; Ms Margaret Mak, Deputy Chief Operations Officer of Miramar Group; Ms Marianne Atkins, Education Director of Redress; Prof. Calvin Wong, Cheng Yik Hung Professor in Fashion and Centre Director of AiDLab.
To promote sustainable fashion and green life concepts to the public, SFT partnered with the Miramar Group to organise the first “Fashion The Future Design Competition” in early 2023. The Miramar Group launched the “Mi Go Green” platform to celebrate its 65th anniversary, in their efforts to advocate for sustainable development and environmental protection to the public and industry. Part of their campaign is to work with SFT along with an environmental protection organisation, Redress, and the Laboratory for Artificial Intelligence in Design (AiDLab) to support the Fashion The Future Design Competition throughout the different stages, including fashion design, material sourcing, and garment production.
The 10 finalists upcycled the recycled clothing or textile waste provided by Redress. Then they used the new Artificial Intelligence Based Fashion Design Assistant (AiDA) that AiDLab developed to quickly conceptualise their collection. This platform helps to reduce the required sample production time and consumption of resources that go into creating new garments, including fabric, accessories, sewing machines, electricity, etc.
The competition finale was held on 15 July at Mira Place where three winners were acknowledged for their creativity, originality and workmanship, including “Blessed Bonds” by Lam Hei Man, “Pantropica” by Ng Pui Pui, and “Mazycle” by Lee Yee Man. Each winner received a cash prize of $10,000. The 20 outfits created by the 10 finalists were displayed from 15 to 31 July in the atrium of Mira Place.
Lam Hei Man is a Year 3 design student. The theme of her collection, “Blessed Bonds”, is based on traditional Chinese quilts. She explained that her two designs symbolically impart good luck: "By sewing these donated clothes together, I hope to create a blessed quilt that will bring good luck to children and families while promoting sustainable design concepts”.
Ng Pui Pui is also a Year 3 design student whose collection “Pantropica” was inspired by ferns that open their leaves during the day and close them at night. Her energetic and functional sportswear collection highlights the vitality and sustainability of plants. After receiving her award, she said: “I am very grateful to the judges who appreciate my work.” She aspires to work in the knitting industry in the future.
Prof Erin Cho, School Dean, also shared her thoughts about the competition: “I hope this competition can cultivate participants' creativity in sustainable fashion and at the same time, attract more young designers who can put this concept into practice and in their future designs. I look forward to similar collaborations in the future to reshape society's definition of ‘fashion’”.
