The City of Denton, TX’s Trashion Fashion program not only promotes recycling and keeping trash out of the waste stream, but it also provides a creative outlet for budding artists. The city’s Recycling Education Coordinator, Alana Presley, discusses the goals of the program and its success.
How did it the Trashion Fashion Program start?As an environmental educator and a mom worried about the future, it is a goal of mine to educate my community about resource conservation. I am always thinking of ways to reach individuals that don’t typically participate in public education programs. Working for the City of Denton Solid Waste and Recycling Department as a Recycling Education Coordinator, I have been given the opportunity and responsibility to move public perception of waste from being a gross burden to a valuable resource. In 2012, Juli Gonzalez, Public Service Librarian at the City of Denton Public Library, and I decided to join forces and create a TRASHion Fashion Program that promotes consumer behavior change through expressive art.
In order to address issues of personal responsibility for both waste generation and litter, we wanted to create a program that promotes behavior change across all areas in the waste reduction hierarchy—reducing the amount of resources used by finding alternatives, reusing items in creative ways, and ultimately recycling them (or disposing of them properly) so they don’t become litter. Working with SCRAP Denton, a creative reuse center, led me to information about TRASHion type events, including Oregon’s Junk to Funk program. I attended the ReUse Conex Conference in October 2012, and interviewed Lindsey Newkirk, founder of Junk to Funk in Portland, Oregon. I also, interviewed Kelley Carmichael-Casey, Executive Director for SCRAP USA. They were both very supportive and shared best practices to make the runway show more exciting for the audience and tips for judging participants.
The TRASHion Fashion Program has become a comprehensive fashion design competition for all ages, where participating designers create wearable art made of items destined for the landfill or recycling. Participants become knowledgeable about problems associated with waste generation and then express them through fashion and artistic design. Not only does this program engage the public, it also encourages them to find solutions and craft their own outreach messages regarding waste minimization. Participants change themselves, then create community awareness, spark conversations and encourage behavior change in the community at large.
What is the goal of this program? To engage students and artists to become knowledgeable about problems associated with waste generation through fashion and artistic design. It encourages them to find solutions and craft their own outreach messages regarding waste minimization. The goal is to have participants change themselves, then create community awareness, spark conversations and encourage behavior change in the community at large. There are four main areas that we concentrate on: 1) increasing participation from a target audience of artists and designers in the Denton area; 2) supporting and promoting our City Sustainability Plan’s goal to minimize municipal solid waste, increase landfill diversion and reduce litter; 3) increasing partnerships and sponsorships from local organizations; and 4) increasing attendance at Keep Denton Beautiful’s Redbud Festival through the TRASHion Fashion Runway Show.
The program is also interdisciplinary, where participating designers attend a series of educational programs and workshops, receive mentoring and conduct independent research about the “waste” materials they are using to create their designs. The designers share information about the problems and solutions regarding their materials during a public TRASHion Runway Show at the Keep Denton Beautiful Redbud Festival, an annual home and garden show celebrating Arbor Day. The garments and facts are then displayed at a month-long art exhibition at the SCRAP Denton ReVision Gallery, a creative reuse center.
How far ahead does the department plan for this event? How do you target participants and attendees? We have already started our 2014 TRASHion Fashion program; we started planning last fall. For the next month we will gather interested participants and start hosting educational meetings. The Solid Waste and Recycling Department uses multiple outlets to educate residents on how and why to participate in city programs, but also stresses behavior change through waste reduction, reuse and product stewardship. Typical outreach and education media include our Web site (www.dentonrecycles.com) and social media pages at Facebook-City of Denton Recycles and Twitter-@DentonRecycles. We offer the My Waste mobile application for iOS and Android. DTV is the City’s cable channel, and the Public Communications Office produces a weekly news report that airs on both DTV and CNN Headline News. These productions are also rebroadcast on our YouTube channel.
Last year, the department purchased an ad on Facebook to promote the TRASHion Fashion Runway Show. The ad was purchased for $50 and ran for six weeks prior to the event. During that time, the ad was clicked 146 times. However, more than 146 people were reached due to social action. As users clicked the ad, they usually helped promote the ad to their friends by sharing or liking it, or by making a comment. This social action resulted in 4,541 impressions that appeared in users’ News Feeds. The ad also invited users to join the event to which 63 users responded that they planned to attend.
On many weekends and evenings we host and attend public events with our mascot Recyclesaurus Rex for opportunities to talk face-to-face with our residents. We design and mail a 12-month calendar that doubles as a brochure with all of our service information, provided to our 27,000 single-family homes. Our Sustainable Schools Program is a comprehensive recycling and education program that is used in more than 35 Denton schools both public and private.
Denton is home to both the University of North Texas (UNT) and Texas Woman’s University (TWU). UNT boasts one of the well-known music schools in the country and has excellent environmental science programs. Denton attracts many artists and musicians with its funky and progressive attitude, its music venues and restaurants and the City’s excellent sustainability programs. It is both an historic and youthful community with a very diverse population. Though we have recycling participation rates of 70 percent from our approximately 27,000 single-family homes, many of our residents are students that live here for a shorter period of time, reflected by nearly 20,000 multi-family living units. To reach these youthful populations that are not easily reached through traditional means, we targeted our highly creative and eclectic residents, and created an event that fit the “original and independent” spirit of our City: The TRASHion Fashion Program harnesses our own resident’s creativity by giving them an outlet to express the need for taking personal action. Fashion design students, local artists, and crafters participated in the design competition, but also helped to mentor the school age (K – 12) designers.
What kind of response has this program had? Has it grown every year? In the program’s first year (2012), young designers were paired with fashion design students from the UNT’s Fashion Club. A series of educational and creative workshops were held, and the young adult participants mentored the youth participants. The initial meeting included a presentation about the global effects of waste generation and hands-on instruction illustrating the differences between reducing, reusing and recycling. A local designer, who specializes in costumes and garments made from trash and reused materials, showed examples of her work. During the four-month program, university students met with youth participants to help design and construct garments. Elementary teachers from two schools incorporated the program into their curriculum, while a local non-profit creative reuse center, SCRAP Denton, offered physical workshop space including sewing machines for all participants.
In April 2012, after the garments were finished, the department hosted a photo shoot for all participants at the working face of the City’s landfill. Dozens of participants and their parents saw firsthand where all waste that is not reused or recycled goes. During the photo shoot, the models reported their unhappiness with the amount of recyclable materials and items that were still usable that were buried in the landfill. The program ended on Earth Day with a runway show hosted at the North Branch Library. The event was larger than expected with 30 designers/models, and over 50 people in the audience. The first year was such a success that we decided to create a larger and more organized event using lessons learned and incorporating new ideas.
In the second year, there was enough interest to expand the program to all ages, and add an educational component. With help from local sponsors, prizes were given to all participants; the prizes included salon gift certificates, up cycled fashion and reuse art from local artists, and small give-a-ways from environmental departments at the City of Denton. Initially, we partnered with Keep Denton Beautiful to host the event during their annual Redbud Festival. This was a perfect match as the festival is a green home and garden show that celebrates Arbor Day and Earth Day. The theme for the 2013 TRASHion Fashion runway show was, It Could Have Been Recycled: Litter in Our Waterways, bringing together KDB’s anti-litter and recycling message, and the Watershed Protection Division’s Reverse Litter campaign. The timeline for the event was much like the previous year with a couple of changes. First, a call for artists was advertised on posters all over town and through social media in early January. On January 29, 2013, the first meeting was held at the Public Library. Like the year past, the meeting consisted of education, information and creative inspiration. This time the education was about litter traveling in the local watershed and marine debris. In addition, a local designer demonstrated examples of fashion, and a presentation was given by SCRAP Denton who also gave out coupons for their creative reuse thrift store. During the meeting participants learned about the new criteria and competition guidelines; the two main changes were the age group competition, and the addition of researched facts. Each participant was sent on their way with two and half months to create garments, and research one factoid to accompany the design.
During the following months participants and event coordinators worked together and independently on designs and planning for the runway show. SCRAP Denton and the library hosted workshops for participants. During the workshops, participants were able to work in groups to sketch designs, research facts, craft patterns, learn to sew and use provided materials. Event coordinators from the Solid Waste Department, Public Library, Watershed Protection Division and Keep Denton Beautiful planned the runway show, and collaborated funding to rent an $800 stage. By mid-April participants wrapped up their finishing touches and the event coordinators made final contacts with vendors and judges for the runway event day.
On April 13, participants gathered for a photo shoot at Pecan Creek, which is located at a popular recreational area and athletic field called North Lakes Park. During the week leading up to the runway event the photos and a press release were shared to local media and through various organizations’ social media sites. The 2013 TRASHion Fashion runway show was well received with positive feedback and enthusiasm from our participants, city council, local school district and community. Additionally, TRASHion messaging reached more than 2,000 people, not including the 4,541 impressions from Facebook.
Currently, we are working on sponsorships for our runway show scheduled to take place at the KDB Redbud festival on April 12, 2014. So far, we have sponsorship from Pratt Recycling Industries and are seeking additional funding. Pratt is a natural sponsorship for us for several reasons. First, Pratt runs our City’s Material Recovery Facility, and is our partner in recycling education for many of our outreach programs. In addition, this year’s TRASHion Fashion theme is, Closing the Loop, which is a common educational goal. On April 5, 2014 we will have our participants do a photo shoot at Pratt’s MRF.
What are the biggest challenges in putting a program like this together? With any project that has multiple partners, bringing the many representatives together and making sure everyone is heard can be the biggest challenge! Our partners included the Denton Public Library, Keep Denton Beautiful, SCRAP Denton, several sponsors and the participants themselves. Other challenges included teaching basic design and sewing skills to our budding young designers, finding the materials needed for the designs that fit the criteria for reuse, scheduling convenient time frames that did not compete with standardized testing and university students’ workloads, ensuring the participants completed their research portion of the program, and provided their information for the runway shows printed program and for the announcer’s script, and getting the participants to the finish line with a product that could be modeled on the catwalk.
To overcome the obstacles and ensure a successful event, a long planning timeline was developed. We scheduled multiple workshops at several locations, including our North Branch Library and at SCRAP Denton on the downtown square. SCRAP offered discounts to participants for any materials purchased there, and information was provided for many other reuse stores. Older participants and mentors were asked to help the young designers learn basic techniques at workshops. Sponsors and volunteers were asked to help get the designers and models ready for the big day.
Are there any changes or improvements planned for future shows? Future program improvements include: incorporating a tool for measuring behavior change, increased participation from public schools and encouraging “Eco-Couture.” Evaluating behavioral change and attitude perception over time is difficult for informal education programs.
Futureevents will include pre- and post- TRASHion Fashion Participant Surveys, allowing us to quantify initial attitude shifts. To increase our public school participation, the curriculum will begin before our State’s standardized test period, which usually falls right in the middle of our event. Finally, we are looking to extend the range of the fashion show to include a thrift store category, and also a sustainable materials category to create awareness about product stewardship.
What kind of advice can you give to organizations that are interested in starting a program like this? TRASHion Fashion unites many sectors of the community, and can be replicated in others. For any community who wishes to replicate this program, it is essential to find a group of partners to collaborate with. This program literally takes a village to be successful.
For more information, contact Alana Presley at [email protected].
Sidebar
2013 Sponsors and Partners
Keep Denton Beautiful
Keep America Beautiful
Reverse Litter
City of Denton Watershed Protection
Sustainable Denton
Rose’s Costume
Davanti Salon
CherryKandy Creations
SCRAP Denton