Looking trashy: Recycled-fashion show finds new venue, new participants

The RE Store’s annual Trash Fashion Show will be open to all ages this year, having moved from a downtown music venue to Western Washington University’s campus.

The annual Recycled Art and Fashion Show put on by The RE Store got a boost this year thanks to the involvement of Western Washington University students.
Twenty of the 30 designs in this year’s show are by students, whose participation made it possible for the fashion show to move to a larger, all-ages venue.
Polly Carpenter, a customer-service representative at The RE Store, said this is the first year Western Washington University has been involved with the event.
In past years, The RE Store in Bellingham has held its trash fashion show at Wild Buffalo House of Music, a venue in downtown Bellingham. This year will be the first time the show is held on Western’s campus.
Courtney Hiatt, who manages the media and performing arts series for the university’s College of Fine and Performing Arts, approached RE Store staff about getting students involved with the show. She said she thought it would tie in well with another art event going on in April: an exhibition at the Western Gallery about artists’ reactions to environmental issues. Hiatt said it made sense to tie the two together because the projects have similar goals.
Getting the show moving
Soon after, with Hiatt’s help, The RE Store staff moved the show to the university’s Viking Union, which Hiatt said is available to any organization on Western’s campus that wants to reserve it.
The new venue is larger and, unlike Wild Buffalo House of Music, will allow people of all ages to attend the fashion show. Hiatt said that was especially important so students who are younger than 21 could be involved in or attend the show.
“The art department said, ‘Let’s do it up here,’” said Jason Darling, The RE Store’s education and marketing coordinator. “It was an obvious match.”
New people design with “different trash”
Students from Western professor Arunas Oslapas’ industrial design class submitted their designs to the fashion show and about a dozen of them were accepted, Darling said.
Hiatt said most of the students in the fashion show are industrial-design students, but a few are from Fairhaven College and the theatre arts department.
“It’s really exciting because students are so über-creative and have access to different trash up at the university than is in the dumpsters downtown,” Darling said. “There’s higher-quality trash on a university campus.”
Darling said he is excited to give so many new people the opportunity to showcase their designs, which he said are more impressive this year than ever.
“People are sharing that gift of creativity and craftsmanship,” Darling said. “We’re just creating a container for it.”
Going to “a whole other level”
Recycled art — defined as work comprised of at least 75 percent recycled materials — from students and other artists was on display through Sunday, April 25 at Allied Arts Gallery on Cornwall Avenue and The RE Store on Meridian Street. The RE Store also has functional pieces on display, including a couch made from an old claw-foot bathtub.
The RE Store in Seattle hosts a similar annual event there; this year’s Seattle show on April 17 marked the first time the event has included two fashion shows in one night. Both shows sold out.
Bellingham’s event has grown, too; the involvement of the university has led to more submissions, a larger venue and the opportunity for people of all ages to attend the fashion show.
“It’s just gone to a whole other level in Bellingham this year,” said Darling, who calls himself the show’s “coordinational hub.” Darling has organized the show in Bellingham for the past five years, and also coordinated last year’s Seattle show.
Adding trash fashion
Although this is the ninth year of the recycled-art show, the trash-fashion part of the event was only added six years ago. The RE Store partnered with designer Robin Worley to add the fashion element to the Seattle show in 2004 and the Bellingham show in 2006.
Worley is an original member of the Haute Trash Troupe, a group of performance artists that stages fashion shows featuring clothes made of everyday trash. The group has performed all over the West, from county fairs to Earth Day festivals to Burning Man.
Darling said trash fashion was a natural fit for The RE Store’s event because the goal of both shows is to get people to look at their garbage in a new way.
“[We thought], ‘Let’s get the recycled art together with the trash fashion and make a really fun, hilarious, wild, sexy event that can be a part of the show,” he said.
Everyone has a treasure can
Hiatt said she hopes student involvement continues in the coming years so students can continue to show their work alongside that of professionals. She said she is not sure whether the show will always be on Western’s campus, but she would like to continue working with The RE Store to keep student designers a part of the show.
Darling said people can save money and reuse things by shopping at thrift stores and at The RE Store, which sells mostly used building materials but also has items like furniture and paint.
“Reuse doesn’t have to be about art and fashion,” Darling said. “In this do-it-yourself era, digging around in your treasure can — instead of your trash can — is becoming an art form.”
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