Connecting clothes with nature at Kew’s Material World
How do our clothes connect us to nature? How can they become part of a future that restores rather than depletes? These are the exact questions Kew’s latest festival explores.
Developed within the iconic glass walls of the Temperate House, Material World is the latest exhibition at Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, and its first devoted to fashion and textiles. Transformed into a bold and hopeful exploration of plant, fungi and fashion, the installations delve into the stories between the threads through art and design as a means to create influence on the fashion industry.
Material World is more than a festival, it’s a call to action
Between 80bn and 100bn new clothing garments are produced globally every year whilst 87% of the materials and fibres used to make clothing end up in landfill or incinerators. The festival vocalises why our relationship with how we wear clothes, as well as how we make them, needs to change.
Across the festival, submissions from artists such as Nnenna Okore and designer Lottie Delamain explore the history of what we wear and its relationship with what we grow.
As you step foot into the largest surviving Victorian glasshouse, Between Earth and Sky decorates the ceiling, installed by Australian-born Nigerian artist, educator and environmentalist Okore. Adorned with colour and crafted from biodegradable materials in the form of a vast wing-like form, the vibrant installation intends to inspire reflection on ecological responsibility.
Curated using organic cotton, hessian and cheesecloth, the bespoke commission floats above Kew’s collection of rare and endangered plants to create an interactive spatial experience. Okore aims to form “deeper connections between fashion, design and the ecosystems that sustain us”.
Global Threads by Lottie Delamin
Located within an octagonal chamber of the glasshouse, award-winning garden designer Delamin has transformed the space into a haven of plants and fabric. “I wanted there to be plenty of colour, and for it to feel like a coherent garden,” says Delamin.
Collected from Traid, a second hand clothes shop warehouse in Wembley, Delamin and her team collated 150 kilos of unwanted clothing after hours of sifting and searching through its vast wardrobe. The organisation encourages second hand clothing to go back into the system, before they reach incineration or landfill sites in areas such as Ghana.
From Primark to Pokemon, the piles of textiles in the warehouse “felt like a drop in the ocean” when trying to reuse and recycle all of the unused materials across the world due to shopping habits, says Delamin.
“It shows the relationship between plants and textiles. We should be looking at plant based solutions for lots of these things so they don’t end up in rivers. It’s to do with waste and our obsessions with new consumption,” explains Delamin.
Material World will reveal the stories within our wardrobes
Other commissioned pieces include a takeover by London College of Fashion (part of University of the Arts London) which explores how the plant world can help the fashion industry achieve sustainable style named Flourishing Features: Growing the Next Era of Fashion.
Threads of the Canopy is another collaborative piece within the festival, where over 50 individuals at Kew’s Community Open Week created a large-scale textile dye map of Kew Gardens.
Flourishing Features: Growing the Next Era of Fashion
Elsewhere, an audio installation curated by Michael McMillan, a writer, playwright and artist, has considered the complicated history and environmental impact of cotton.
Hosting After Hours events with DJs, poetry demonstrations and costume performances, to industry-led talks on sustainable styling and hands-on workshops, Material World connects natural materials with fashion for Kew’s visitors.
Supported by Cazenove Capital, Material World is available to visit from 20 September until 2 November.