Vlisco: The Beauty of Waste by Simone Post

Upcycling leftovers from Dutch textile mainstay Vlisco – wax-coated textiles popular in central and west Africa – Design Academy Eindhoven graduate and Keep an Eye Grant winner Simone Post develops a new series of interior applications. In keeping with the brand’s high quality production – in place since the mid 19th-century – the designer employs new folding and laser-cutting techniques to give ‘misprints’ 3D life and in-turn intrinsic value. Rugs, seat covers, panels and fashion accessories are wound in different colour and textured combinations, based on Vlisco’s rich offering of eclectic prints. A full gamut is currently on view as part of the Design Academy Eindhoven’s Dutch Design Week graduation show. This graduation project is a perfect example of how students can already address the market and collaborate with ‘real world’ companies.

“The Vlisco process of designing and producing wax fabrics is complex and involves more than 20 different steps,” Posts describes.” “Some main steps are: printing the wax, dyeing, breaking the wax, printing with felt rollers, silkscreen printing, fixating and possible after-treatments. In all these steps things can go wrong. Because of Vlisco’s high quality standards, there is always a certain amount of fabrics that are ultimately rejected. Until now, Vlisco has not yet found a good destination for this, which means almost all waste cloth ends up destroyed”

Post has also be selected by Hella Jongerius to be part of the ByTextielMuseum collection which also includes works by Viktor&Rolf and Formafantasma. Her work tends to pay homage yet recalibrate age-old processes to conceive new solutions.

Design Academy Eindhoven’s Graduation Show is held at deWitteDame: Emmasingel 14, Eindhoven, till 25 October, 11:00 to 18:00