New work from TED members has gone on show at the Science Museum's new exhibition Trash Fashion: Designing out Waste which is open till March 2011. We attended the launch last week and the exhibition is fantastic!

Aside from the pieces from TED members, there is a new piece from Suzanne Lee's BioCouture project who makes garments from fabric that she 'grows' and a new knitted piece from Sandy Black's Considerate Design project.

There are also some really insightful videos of interviews with some of the designers and their working process.

More images here.

The highlight of the year for our second year BA students is their fashion show, which has been held at prestigious venues in the past such as the Tate Britain and the Wallace Collection. This year the show was held here at Millbank in the historic Banqueting Hall.

The project brief was 'Sway', created by TED's Professor Kay Politowicz, who also included several sustainable design strategies in the brief.

The show was blogged about by Made, a new online furniture website from the people behind My Deco. The students will be doing a project with Made next year, incorporating an ethical production facility in Africa. Made were invited to the fashion show and to a sneak preview of some of the final year graduate work being finished off in the studios, which is on show from this Saturday 19th June here at Millbank.

Becky Earley went to Ireland a couple of weeks ago, to be the external examiner to the BA Textile Design course at NCAD, in Dublin. The 25 final year students produced work in print, embroidery and weave disciplines. Several of the students have begun to consider the environmental impacts of their work, and the highlights included a ‘slow textiles’ furnishings collection by Jennifer Slattery and a recycled / deconstructed Aran knit menswear collection by Paddy Rooney (paddyrooney@live.co.uk).

New upcycled work for Science Museum

The TED team is busy preparing some exciting new work which will be on show at an exhibition called Trash Fashion...Designing Out Waste in the Wellcome Wing at the Science Museum in London, from June till March 2011.

In true collaborative style, several members are working together to create two 'looks' - Melanie Bowles and Kathy Round are working on a beautiful digitally printed dress while Becky Earley has created one of her signature overprinted polyester shirts which will be shown with silver electroplated lace by Frances Geesin.

Kate Goldsworthy will also be exhibiting some new work using laser technology to resurface polyester fabrics as a seperate exhibit.

This has been a great opportunity for all the designers to push further the techniques and ideas explored during the Worn Again / Ever & Again project.

Inspiration for a textile print design can come from anywhere and Melanie Bowles' latest idea for her bespoke print design service came from the humblest of materials - cardboard. Working with the owners of new interiors boutique Circus, in Brixton Market, Mel was inspired to make a new print from the cardboard that has been used to construct the whole interior of the new boutique.

The fabric was then made up into a simple apron-style skirt and is being worn by the owners of the boutique.

The IMPACT lecture series is one of the highlights of the TED teaching calender here at Chelsea. It covers the environmental impacts throughout the lifecycle of a textile product - from raw materials, yarn/fibre and fabric production through to the use phase and to the end of life issues.

The lectures always include a 'designer case study' - a designer or practitioner who presents their work to demonstrate how they are grappling with these issues.

For the beginning of the lifecycle, we invited Karen Spurgin and Emma D'arcy to present their work. Karen and Emma have formed a collective called AO Textiles and they are working to create sustainable textiles for the couture fashion market. Karen worked with Deborah Millner on the Aveda project back in 2006, in which they created a collection of beautiful dresses which each explored an aspect of sustainability. Karen has 20 years of experience as an embroidery designer for high-end fashion clients and she was moved to begin working in a more considerate way as there was no couture fabrics available for them to work with.

AO are currently collaborating with Gainsborough, a traditional silk weave company, on a fabric made from natural dyes and waste yarn and hope to develop more design collaborations and research projects in the future.