Creative Practice & Fashion ‘labour’ during ‘lockdown’

• Linda Watson – Reader in Fashion (Northumbria University, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, UK) ‘Reinventing the fashion narrative:  How Graduate Fashion Foundation adapted to the unprecedented challenges presented by the Covid 19 pandemic.’

   Biographical Profile

  Currently Reader in Fashion at Northumbria University, Linda Watson has given guest lectures at the V&A Museum, the Fashion and Textile Museum, the Museum of London, Fashion Museum Bath, the Lebanese American University, Beirut, Syracuse University, Academy of Design in Sri Lanka, London College of Fashion, the Conde Nast College of Design, Manchester Metropolitan University and Glasgow School of Art.  A contributor to The Independent newspaper for 30 years (where she has written their fashion related obituaries) Linda Watson is also a former Fashion Writer for British Vogue and author of Vogue on Vivienne Westwood, Vogue Twentieth Century Fashion and Fashion Visionaries. Graduating from Northumbria University with a double first in Fashion in 1987, she worked with Vivienne Westwood on design, Celia Birtwell on research and the late Jean Muir on Speechwriting.  

   

• Elizabeth Gaston – Senior Lecturer (Northumbria University, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, UK) ‘Zoom Hoods - Fashion Research in and for a Global Pandemic’

   

  Biography: As a maker, researcher and educator, my work is located in the use of knit as a research tool, utilising the unique, non-homogenous properties of knitted fabrics. This can be specified by material use, fabric structure and fabric form, using knowledge of materials, technology, process and aesthetics. Work explores practical design solutions and theory generation following an interdisciplinary approach, often through collaboration, using methodologies from fashion, architecture, physics, psychology, dance and poetry.  It has been disseminated widely in exhibitions, journal papers and international conference presentations.

   https://www.postdigitalknit.com  

   

• Catherine Glover – Senior Lecturer in Fashion Comms & Prog. leader MRes Design, (Northumbria University, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, UK) 'Hope: A sensorial Story of Lockdown.’

   Catherine Glover is a Senior Lecturer in Fashion Communication and Programme Leader of Masters of Research Design in the School of Design at Northumbria University (UK). She lectures on sustainability, fashion public relations, brand strategy, storytelling, journalism, brand copywriting, editorial publishing and activism. Her educational interests are experiential learning, running live briefs with industry partners and engaging students with issues and values-based communication and research.

   Catherine is also a PhD student researching into transnational storytelling, specifically how social and brand communities enact story processes that inspire grassroots action. She has published articles on the luxury brand Rapha, Harris Tweed, the Tweed Run, and her role as a madoguchi reporting on British fashion, craft, design and architecture for Japanese avant-garde publication, Hanatsubaki.

   Her research has appeared in the Critical Journal of Fashion and Beauty (11.1), International Journal of Fashion (4.2), Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management (22.1) and Understanding Luxury Fashion: From Emotions to Brand Building (Palgrave Macmillan, eds. Cantista and Sábada, 2019). She has presented her research to peer and industry audiences at the Global Fashion Conference 2016, 2018, 2020 and the Design History 2019 'Cost of Design' conference. She is currently researching into nostalgia and clothing, Fashion Revolution and the paradoxical nature of fashion and sustainability, and writing autobiographical fashion poetry.

   Prior to academia, Catherine worked for fifteen years in industry as a luxury fashion PR, design journalist, copyeditor, and editorial coordinator in arts publishing. 

• Christopher Hodge – Senior Lecturer in Fashion Comms – Northumbria University, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, UK) – ‘Broken Ribs: Crafting through Covid-19.’

  Biography: Christopher Hodge is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Design at Northumbria University, where for over 20 years he has taught students across Fashion Communication, Fashion Design, and Fashion Design and Marketing. He is also a core member of the international delivery of Northumbria’s fashion programme at BINUS Northumbria University (Jakarta, Indonesia). His research interests involve: garment making, photographic styling, craft practice and creative writing. Chris has presented his work internationally and is currently developing his practice based research exploring crafting and identities.

Creative revisions/innovations to fashion media, events & markets

Catherine Greenwood – Research Assistant, (UCLAN, Preston, UK) - What Impact Does Instagram Have on The Way In Which British Female Millennials Fashion And Validate Their Social Identity And Social Status Through The Use Of Instagram As A Fashion Editorial?

Bio: I am currently studying for a PhD under the school of arts design and media within the university of central Lancashire, my research interests surrounding Fashioning social identity, the language of fashion and dress and material culture. Where possible I lecture within the school in critical and contextual studies in fashion and textiles. Additionally, working in the capacity of a research assistant to Dr Carole Hunt, in the continuation of her work regarding patient clothing within Lancashire’s pauper and lunatic asylums.

Steve Walls – Lecturer (Newcastle University, UK) – Promotional strategies through lockdown – evaluating socially distanced events throughout a global pandemic.

Bio: Lecturer in Media, Communication & Cultural Studies at Newcastle University. Steve holds 15 years of practitioner experience in fashion management (retail, brand relations, merchandising and promotions) alongside over 10 years of experience in curriculum development, module and programme leadership on one of the UK’s leading undergraduate degree courses in Media, Communication & Cultural Studies. Employing a variety of critical and cultural theory to inform his research and pedagogical expertise his areas of interest explore the historical and contemporary landscapes of advertising & consumption, fashion communications, masculinities & sexuality, social media & representation, work & leisure. Publications & Projects include Examining Male Service Work: Gendered and Sexualised Aesthetics (2012, Lambert Academic Publishing); Disrupted Knowledge: Scholarship in a Time of Change (co editor, forthcoming 2022 Brill/Haymarket) & Advertising, Promotional Culture and Consumption: Theory, Strategies & Practice, (Forthcoming 2022, Palgrave); MCH: Advertising & Promotions Challenge (student competition & game-based pedagogical project); Mediating 2020 (co-editor, peer-reviewed podcast series, Palgrave).

Alana M. James – Senior Lecturer in Fashion (Northumbria University, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, UK) ‘Building Resilience in Fashion Retail towards the “New normal”’

 Bio: Dr Alana M James is a Senior Lecturer in Fashion at Northumbria University in Newcastle upon Tyne and is currently Programme Leader for MA Fashion Design. Her research explores responsible innovation within the garment supply chain, promoting more sustainable processes in the manufacture and consumption of fashion products. Working with multiple stakeholders, her work aims to create a transparent and accountable value chain, towards a sustainable future for the fashion industry.

Mark Sumner – Lecturer in Sustainability, Retail & Fashion, (University of Leeds) 'Ethical practices in Fashion supply chains: Resilience and the Covid 19 Pandemic'

Bio: Mark Sumner is a lecturer in Sustainable Fashion with specialist knowledge of the clothing industry and its associated global textile supply chain. His expertise is built upon over 15 years of experience working for the UK’s largest clothing retailer, as well as his more recent academic research. His experience is further enhanced through a range of consultancy and advisory roles with brands, retailers and industry bodies exploring the future of sustainable fashion.

His current research topics include the sustainability of textile supply chains, circularity, microplastics, modern slavery and consumer behaviour. He is currently engaged in an AHRC funded project exploring the impacts of the Covid 19 pandemic on the implementation of the UK government’s Modern Slavery Act.

Social Responsibility, Fashion & ethics during the Pandemic

Karen Dennis – Ketchup Clothes – ‘Revolutions Come in Cycles: Part 2’

Bio: I am a lecturer, designer and maker who has been actively involved in sustainable design, social enterprise and academia for the past 25 years. I worked as a designer/pattern cutter in the fashion industry for 5 years after which I held lecturing positions at Leeds University (Programme Manager BA Hons Fashion Design Management), Leeds College of Art and Design (Critical Studies) and Huddersfield University (Programme Manager MA International Fashion Design Management). In these roles I contributed to cross disciplinary teaching and learning, developed and delivered resources pertaining to fashion, design and contextual studies and pursued interests in practice-based research. In 2004 I established a social enterprise (Ketchup Clothes) to provide a context for the design, manufacture and consumption of clothes made from found and recycled materials. Through this I continue to develop prototypes for manufacture, provide training and workshops and explore mechanisms for upscaling models of circular production. https://ketchupclothes.com/

Elizabeth Kramer – Senior Lecturer Design History (Northumbria University, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, UK) ‘Fashionable Face Coverings: fashionability and responsibility in the marketing of cloth masks’

 Dr Elizabeth Kramer is a Senior Lecturer in Design History, specialising in transnational fashion, textiles and material culture with a specialisation in fashion and textile exchanges between Japan and Britain.

 Before joining Northumbria University in 2009 as Senior Lecturer in Design History, Elizabeth Kramer held a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship in Historical Studies at Newcastle University (2007-9), during which time she conducted research on the material culture of manias. This expanded upon her research on the Japan mania in Victorian Britain (1875-1900) conducted during a previous postdoctoral fellowship in Material Culture-Textiles for the AHRC Research Centre for Textile Conservation and Textile Studies (2005-7). Her interest in what we can learn about the participants in, and critics of, manias as informed by the material culture associated with them as well as her interest in Anglo-Japanese artistic exchange stemming from the topic of her PhD, "Art, Industry and Design: Japanese and Anglo-Japanese Textile Culture in Victorian Britain, 1862-1900", completed at The University of Manchester in 2004.

 Dr Kramer is a longstanding member of the Design History Society.  In 2019, she convened the Society’s annual conference on the topic of ‘The Cost of Design’, which considered the relationship between design and economy, at Northumbria University (https://costofdesign2019.com/).  She is a member of the Editorial Board for Visual Culture in Britain, published by Routledge, and Committee Member for the Society for the Study of Japonisme.  She is also a member of the AHRC Peer Review College.