DESIGN + EDUCATION

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design

Sustainable knowledge in communities: Design for social good through fashion education

AuthorInstitution
De Meillon, ZannéUniversity of Johannesburg

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Sustainable knowledge in communities.pdf

Design for social good refers to the application of design knowledge and skills to solve problems to enable a better future. From a fashion perspective, design for social good could refer to the pursuit of environmental sustainability and to uplift communities. Design education, at undergraduate-level aims to encourage students to apply design knowledge to improve the world and potentially introduce research methodology. However, literature concerning pedagogical strategies for design for social good in a South African fashion design higher education context is lacking. To fill this gap, a design for social good teaching and learning project was presented to third year Fashion Diploma students at a South African fashion higher education institution.

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Students’ attitudes towards change: Co-design in fashion education

AuthorInstitution
Harvey, NeshaneUniversity of Johannesburg

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Students’ attitudes towards change.pdf

Co-design, under the broader scope of human-centred design, refers to an approach, attitude, alternative way of thinking, and engagement with design practice. In an educational context, although limited, scholarship exists around co-design pedagogy, which coincides with the need for future-focused design education, including fashion. However, a research gap exists in terms of student attitudes towards co-design practice. Also, a further gap exists regarding fashion education, in that conventional pedagogies that foster a culture of designer-centeredness and self-expressivity remain at the forefront, with educators reluctant to embrace a co-design pedagogy. Hence, the criticality of fashion education is questionable in terms of its future-focus.

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Reimagining fashion design education: Exploring generative AI in early-stage ideation

AuthorInstitution
Pasiya, ThulisaniVillioti Fashion Institute

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Reimagining fashion design education.pdf

The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence and digital technologies is prompting significant shifts in fashion design education, aligning with global transformations under the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR). This paper examines how generative AI platforms such as ChatGPT, Midjourney and DALL·E are influencing early fashion design ideation and concept formation, especially at the sketch and exploration stages (Särmäkari & Vänskä 2021; Zhou et al. 2023). These tools are reshaping creative workflows by supporting faster visual exploration, expanding conceptual possibilities, and encouraging sustainable practices.

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Folding memory: The Swahili khanga as a contemporary design language

AuthorInstitution
Kavishe, Juliet MGreenside Design Center

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Folding memory.pdf

This design research explores the intersection of traditional African textile heritage and contemporary design practice through the reinterpretation of the Swahili khanga.

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Cultural continuity in Xhosa women’s clothing

AuthorInstitution
Zamela, ZandileUniversity of Johannesburg

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Cultural continuity in Xhosa women’s clothing.pdf

Cultural evolution is an integral part of cultural preservation, especially in relation to fashion because culture interlaces the survival, representation and the everyday practices of a specific collectives of people. As clothing forms part of everyday practices and is viewed simultaneously with the body, it serves as a visual tool for the expression of individual and social identities. Clothing is arguably the most visually expressive aspects of cultural identity.

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Clothing manufacturing micro-enterprises (CMMEs): Preserving cultural pride through fashion production

AuthorInstitution
Strydom, MarietteUniversity of South Africa

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Clothing manufacturing micro-enterprises.pdf

Traditional garments are not merely clothes; they are objects transmitting our stories and the expertise of skilled artisans. Tradition is also passed down in the creation and construction of our clothes, and the way artefacts, like clothes, are made, including the materials and the processes, are all embedded into our communities and cultures. In South Africa, consumers obtain personalised garments, such as traditional dress, from informal clothing manufacturing micro-enterprises (CMMEs). These CMMEs cater to local customers’ needs, providing them with individual and exclusive garments. However, little is known about how informal CMMEs design and develop apparel for their customers.

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Exploring non-placement work-integrated-learning (WIL) through industry-endorsed hybrid-curricular projects for fashion graduate success

AuthorInstitution
Svendsen, HeidiStadio
Sutherland, MerieStadio
Treurnicht, FranciscaStadio
Segal, JennaStadio

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Svendsen - Exploring non-placement work-integrated-learning.pdf

To thrive in the fast-paced fashion industry, graduates must possess critical skill sets upon entering the workforce to ensure they are fully prepared for employment. This immediate need from the fashion industry necessitates that students gain practical, experience-based inputs from the fashion curricula pitched within the fashion higher education environment.

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Envisioning an effective education system for Generation Alpha focused on skills development in the fashion design higher education sector

AuthorInstitution
van Rooyen, AnelStadio
Van Renssen, SanriStadio

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Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
vRooyen - Envisioning an effective education system for Generation Alpha.pdf

The design higher education system of today will not be applicable to the demands and requirements of tomorrow (Munir & Nudin 2021). Furthermore, Generation Alpha introduces a new challenge to our current education systems, demanding a new approach to education. Accordingly, Karen Gross, the author of Breakaway learners, believes that universities should begin adapting to cater to Generation Alpha, suggesting that thinking ahead is crucial in planning and contemplating the future's implications (Hall 2017).

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Higher education: Cultural agent to address consumer demand in the creative fashion economy

AuthorInstitution
Kempen, Elizabeth LUniversity of South Africa

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Kempen - Higher education Cultural agent to address consumer demand.pdf

Higher education institutions have an ever-increasing role to play in the creative economy of South Africa. The relationship between higher education institutions and the creative economy manifests through the skills, training, and knowledge transferred to students, thereby supporting this economy through job creation, addressing Sustainable Development Goal 8. The local fashion industry is a creative industry of which the custom-made fashion designer is essential. These designers offer locally made traditional and culturally specific custom-made garments to customers in South Africa that communicate the culturally significant heritage of their wearer.

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Textualising visual stimulus: A visual methodology to encourage innovation in fashion design education

AuthorInstitution
anse van Rensburg, MiekeNelson Mandela University

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
JansevRensburg - Textualising visual stimulus A visual methodology.pdf

Fashion design and its pedagogy is fundamentally centred around visual representation. A core conceptual component of the fashion industry and design education is mood boards, concept boards or trend boards, which purpose is to communicate design direction or intent and to provide a starting point for the design process. Content for these boards relies predominantly on visual data; due to the internet and social media, students and designers have unlimited access to visual stimulus. Reflecting on personal design constraints and teaching experiences in fashion design at a leading South African design education institution, it became clear that the influx of visual data, both through the use of these boards and freely available images on social media, affects original design thinking.

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South African futurism: Students’ vision of future aesthetics in fashion design

AuthorInstitution
Potgieter, TereseStadio
Schreuder, DiandraStadio
Poulsen, JamesStadio

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Potgieter - South African futurism Students’ vision of future aesthetics in fashion design.pdf

While considering new pathways in design, we envisioned the futuristic aesthetic of fashion in the South African context. Although fashion designers work with complex and multifaceted problems, the cornerstone of good design remains beautiful aesthetics; thus, when imagining the progression of South African design, we start with an investigation of aesthetics.

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Exploring the need for fashion drawing skills training amongst unqualified fashion entrepreneurs in the Emfuleni local municipality

AuthorInstitution
Strydom, Le-nikaVaal University of Technology
van Staden, HanlieVaal University of Technology

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Strydom - Exploring the need for fashion drawing skills training.pdf

Fashion entrepreneurs contribute greatly to the local and South African economy. It is, therefore, vital to equip fashion entrepreneurs with necessary knowledge and skills, to ensure the success of their entrepreneurships. Fashion entrepreneurship demands occupation-specific skills. Without these skills, client satisfaction levels can decrease, influencing the success of the entrepreneurship.

This article aims to describe the need existing amongst peri-urban fashion entrepreneurs without formal fashion-related training, with regard to the possession and utilisation of fashion drawing skills. A quantitative approach by means of interviewer-administered questionnaires was employed to explore this need. Non-probability sampling was used to identify 114 respondents.

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Problem placement in fashion design practice: Reflections and recommendations for fashion design education in an era of complexity

AuthorInstitution
Potgieter, TereseStadio
Lavelle, CarolUniversity of Johannesburg

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Problem placement in fashion design practice: Reflections and recommendations for fashion design education in an era of complexi

This paper identifies the desired design outcomes and problem domains of experienced Johannesburg fashion designers, to provide recommendations for fashion design practice and education. Traditional fashion design education often emphasises aesthetics and technical construction before strategically deciding on where the design effort needs to be focused within complex integrated systems. However, within the context of the fourth industrial revolution (4IR), complex integrated systemic thinking is becoming increasingly important. As such, this paper provides an overview of the design outcomes of practising fashion designers and explores the correlation between the problems they manage and Buchanan’s (1998) seminal proposition of problem framing and placement domains.

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Learning from a distance: A conceptual teaching framework that supports positive emotions and novelty during independent fashion design processes

AuthorInstitution
de Wet, LeeUniversity of Johannesburg

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Learning from a distance: A conceptual teaching framework that supports positive emotions and novelty during independent fashion

The importance of cultivating a creative mindset in fashion design students to eventually thrive in the rapidly changing work environment that demands novelty in design is becoming increasingly relevant from an educational perspective. In addition, the challenges to enhance creative design processes of students have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, which caused a sudden transformation from traditional contact education, to online and later blended learning. This implies that educators are challenged to re-think traditional strategies of teaching creativity to align to the shifting conditions.

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I think (sustainably) there 4IR: Exploring design thinking through a first principle approach in fashion praxis

AuthorInstitution
Haupt, DiandraStadio

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
I think (sustainably) there 4IR: Exploring design thinking through a first principle approach in fashion praxis

As fashion is becoming increasingly more inclusive of environmentally friendly fibres and sustainable textile solutions, consideration needs to be given to other applications of sustainable strategies within fashion design praxis (Gwilt & Rissanen, 2011, p. 57). Concepts such as design for sustainability, which centres on cutting waste, upcycling and fibre recycling strategies have become commonplace within the industry. A greater focus needs to be placed on developing new ways of clothing construction processes (Fletcher & Grose, 2012, p. 48).

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Exploring manual and digital pattern design methodologies towards the development of the design education offering

AuthorInstitution
Scheepers, AnnelizeStadio

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Exploring manual and digital pattern design methodologies towards the development of the design education offering

This paper considers the importance of preserving ‘hand-skills’ in fashion design education for students to acquire the ability to visualise the shape, proportion and fit of a garment instead of relying solely on a computer. In addition, the apparel industry requirement for patternmakers to be familiar with digital patternmaking technology to speed up the efficiency of the patternmaking component of the manufacturing process is of equal importance. Both techniques are examined and compared in the research.

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Masking-up with 4IR fashion design education: A retrospective analysis

AuthorInstitution
Bediako, KimberlyUniversity of Johannesburg
Baloyi, TinyikoUniversity of Johannesburg
Harvey, NeshaneUniversity of Johannesburg

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Masking-up with 4IR fashion design education: A retrospective analysis

For decades, studio-based pedagogy, grounded in socially-engaged, constructivist learning spaces dominated design education (Crowther 2013; Shreeve, 2015). However, the global pandemic forced design education to align with the fourth industrial revolution (4IR) and move towards interactive digital technologies and online teaching and learning methodologies. Positioned in the space of 4IR, the move to digital technologies is required to digitally streamline and integrate human-centred opportunities for inclusivity guided by technological advancements (Chuo 2019, pp. 107).

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Social media facilitates custom-made apparel design decisions: The future for business smart fashion designers

AuthorInstitution
Kempen, Elizabeth LUniversity of South Africa
Strydom, MarietteUniversity of South Africa
Tobias-Mamina, RejoiceUniversity of South Africa

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Social media facilitates custom-made apparel design decisions: The future for business smart fashion designers

Fashion design entrepreneurs (FDEs) are compelled to embrace digitalisation to create a competitive advantage and provide the Web 2.0 (participative and social web) smart customer with the service they require. The purpose of this research was to determine how social media facilitates custom-made apparel design decisions in the FDE context. This study sets out to apply the third-generation activity theory to show the role social media plays in the activity system's result between a customer and FDE during the design process. Qualitative data from three independent exploratory studies conducted in Gauteng, South Africa, were used.

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Studio jewellery processes for the post-cyber designer

AuthorInstitution
Caru SmutsCape Peninsula University of Technology
Di Ruvo, MonicaCape Peninsula University of Technology

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Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
Studio jewellery processes for the post-cyber designer

The cyber revolution has emphasised the dialogue regarding perceptions of value between the mechanically produced and the handmade jewellery piece. The application of modern digital design technology with traditional methods of working by hand in the studio jewellers’ practice raises questions of authorship, authenticity, and artisanship.

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