Designer Kristel Erga documents, through her design, how textile scraps can be recycled into raw material for new production. On February 7-9, Erga exhibits at the Surface Design Show at London’s Business Design Centre.
According to business estimates, the fashion industry ends up discarding almost as much as it produces. Since graduating from Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti in Milan in 2009, Erga has specialised in creating wallpaper and -décor from textile scraps. Her sustainable magnetic wallpaper, which draws on production surplus from well-known Norwegian fashion designer
Leila Hafzi, constituted the foundation for her MA exhibition at Chelsea College of Art and Design last year. “The idea is to create an interactive product which enables you to piece together your own wall décor,” she says about her Magnetic Wallpaper. Simply explained, she has created a new raw material from pre-consumer waste by recycling textile scraps inspired by old paper-making techniques.
London-based Erga was born in Stavanger, Norway, in 1984. She has presented of her own collection at Habitus Baltic in Riga in 2010 and was recently picked as a talent to watch during Oslo Fashion Week. Later this spring she will participate in Textile Waste as a Resource, an international competition staged by the Norwegian Institute for Consumer Research and The Nordic Fashion Association.
Kristel Erga
Surface Design Show
7-9 February
Business Design Centre
52 Upper Street
N1 0QH London