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These three makes are amongst my most favourite. They showcase a range of my exploration and love affair with denim. Earlier in the year I was lucky enough to attend a denim workshop led by Endrime at Blackhorse Lane Ateliers, where I made my very own pair of jeans from scratch. Yes from scratch….!  Before the workshop my emotions ranged from pure excitement to pure fear! I come from a fine art background and a fairly conceptual take on it at that, as a self-taught pattern cutter/sewer. I did feel slightly nervous. How complicated was this going to be? Would it look professional? More worrying: would mine fall apart after one wear…should I even wear them? What if I get stains all over them…?

Sewing scratches together
A jeans made of scratch

But I made them. I wear them. I LOVE THEM! And I freeze them when they need laundering {best way to look after denim!} After this my love affair with denim grew and grew and I became fascinated with the simply sublime architecture of denim garments. I fell in love with the traditional artisan way of felling and the touch of indigo dyed cotton.

 

My next denim artefact was in fact a £1 pair of jeans… I found these in a charity shop in Portslade and loved the waistband. It was the first thing that attracted me to them, but it just needed shifting over a bit to fit more snuggly. So that’s exactly what I did. I marked out and cut out new button holes and left the rest to show the story of the previous owner and the beginning of the story of their now new owner.

Fixed waistband

 

After that I couldn’t resist and went for a ‘hat-trick’. I dug out the two old pairs jeans I had in the loft and created my final piece which I really like. It weighs a hefty amount but that is one of the things I love about denim. Its robust weightiness! Unpicked the two pairs of jeans and re-stitched them together on the inside leg to create a full length skirt…and the Denim love still lingers on. What I particularly like, is that I went through the process of making a pair of jeans from scratch to making only one alteration in the two second pieces. Both confidently inspired by my new found knowledge of jeans making!

Two jeans from the loft
Restitching them together

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Georgina Hooper is an academic, artist and textiles designer, teaching fashion, textiles, art and craft based therapy through the concept and practise of mindfulness. By professional practise she is an Artist who explores the interrelations between performance, fashion and textiles. As a Textile Designer with an alchemistic angle, she is exploring curious ways of merging and cross contaminating processes and techniques together, conceptually, physically and sustainably. She is the founder of SU:STAIN – which is my ongoing research practise exploring mindfulness and creativity through sustainability in the here and now through outreach workshops across the UK and beyond.