Junk Kouture

For the first time in the Ardee Community School’s history, we had 2 groups of students enter the famous Junk Kouture competition!

Junk Kouture is an international television fashion competition for secondary school students, where teams design, create and model fashion, made from recycled items.

‘The competition aims to unleash young people’s creative brilliance and to empower them to embrace the principle of sustainable living.’

Our two teams wanted to create powerful designs which highlight certain environmental issues that they feel strongly about. There is only 3 students on each team and together they designed and made their outfits by hand. Here’s an explanation of each of their designs.

Team 1: The Whistle Blowers

Members: Emma Courtney, Maya Chanda and Kate Powderly

Theme: Waste in Gaelic football kits and the gender gap in sports.

“We picked the issue of waste in Gaelic football because we are all involved in the LGFA clubs. There is a lot of waste in GAA because county and senior teams rebrand annually. A lot of equipment, such as water bottles couldn’t be shared due to Covid and so had to be thrown out. We decided to use these materials to shed light on the issue of the waste.

We are also motivated by the gender gap that occurs in sport. By the age of 13, 50% of girls in Ireland have quit their sport. We find that we sometimes don’t get the same opportunities as boys.

We also wanted to design a dress to embrace the femininity in women’s sport. The skirt is made from tongues from football boots and the sleeves of jerseys. We created the top by crocheting laces and using the fabric from football boots. Our earrings, shoes and headpiece are all made from water bottles that we cut up and spray painted.” – The Whistleblowers

Team 2: Fashion, It’s Furious!

Members: Abigael Martin, Eve Fitzsimons and Ava McCormack

Theme: The fast fashion industry

“Our Junk Kouture journey started with a close examination of Fast Fashion and how the various destructive effects on our environment and the impact of women’s workers’ rights.

We created our jumpsuit using a gradient of light to dark grey which represents the moving away from the dark ways of the sweat shops to a brighter future in which we can experience more sustainable fashion.

Our cape portrays a woman taking off her mask. This image signifies the importance of speaking out on important issues like women workers’ rights and climate change.” – Fashion It’s Furious

The flowers on the outfit are made from old red and blue material representing our school colours. The flowers are falling down the outfit which symbolise the sand in an hourglass and our planet running out of time.’ – Fashion It’s Furious!

Both teams have worked tirelessly on their pieces since October, spending long hours designing, hand making and piecing together their outfits, at home, after school and during free classes. They have shown such an immense dedication to this project and have impressed us all with their creative response to the challenge of this competition.

While we are absolutely delighted to announce that one of our groups ‘Fashion, It’s furious’ were successful in getting through to the regional finals! We are equally disappointed to say that our other team weren’t as successful. We saw how hard both teams worked and so know how disappointing it can be to not get through to the next round. The students have been so supportive of each other and we commend them all for their good sportsmanship and consideration for each other.

Our ‘Fashion, It’s Furious’ group have done amazingly well to get through to the regional final and we wait and hope that they are successful in the next stage of the competition which will be announced live on the Junk Kouture YouTube channel on Sunday 27th of March at 7pm!

Click here to watch live!

https://www.youtube.com/c/junkkoutureofficial/featured

Well done Abigael, Eve, Ava, Emma, Maya and Kate on all your hard work and dedication.

The Art and Home Ec Departments.