The Secondary Ocean Issue

The design was inspired by the oil spill, which is the secondary disaster of the climate crisis. The climate crisis is a consequence of the over-usage of fossil fuels. Generally, the public mainly cares about extreme temperatures and the melting issue caused by carbon dioxide. The fashion industry is known as the world's second-largest polluter due to the greenhouse gas emission of overproduction and stock destruction by burning. However, Vogue Taiwan’s cover reminded me that secondary disasters have been ignored. Therefore, I decided to choose oil spills as my main concept and tried to find a sustainable fashion method as my final expression. The final design is influenced by Alexander McQueen’s S/S 2010 collection for its good fashion expression of the melting issue. Instead of traditional print methods, the acrylic print was used to create the oil spill pattern because of its liquidity, which is able to achieve a similar appearance to a polluted ocean. In addition, the manipulation on top represents all the creatures that died because of the disaster. I hope to raise public awareness of secondary disasters like oil spills while supporting a more sustainable fashion trend through this work. Printing visually-striking fabrics and creating everyday objects could subtly make people aware of the climate crisis we are facing. At the same time, I’ve shown a simple way to upcycle fashion items to make a sustainable world.