No Bull Cause
No Bull Cause is my most ambitious project yet. It takes everything I learnt in my 3 years at RMIT Design School and implements into a single multi-award winning project. No Bull began as my final year project for my Bachelor of Communication Design and ended up being a real business.
The project is a direct follow up to my collaboration with ZeroTag and Into Carry in 2023. I wasn’t satisfied by how many virgin materials were used in the production of the bag, I knew there had to be another way to create a business without taking additional resources from the planet.
The No Bull Cause is a clothing brand that makes no new clothes. I take the clothes people don’t want and turn them into something they do. I do this by fixing, dying, printing and rebranding garments. There’s enough clothes out there, but people need to start wearing them. Sustainable self expression is a No Bull Cause.
View all clothes created so far here.
Brief
Create a sustainable clothing brand concept
One Hell of a Problem
Fashion waste is a big problem, people buy 60% more clothes than they did 15 years ago but wear each item 50% less before it no longer holds value to them. The fashion industry is the third biggest polluter in the world, behind fuel/gas and agriculture. We clearly don’t need to be buying and making more clothes, but people still want to express themselves through fashion, that’s not going to change.
What if your clothes evolved over time instead of becoming waste?
I wanted to explore ways that trash could be transformed into treasure. I used my fine art and graphic design knowledge to create unique designs to be printed on wasted fashion garments. The designs feature trash found in and around Melbourne's CBD, changing peoples relationships with trash and selling it back to them shrouded in a different context.
I realised that if I could use design to sell waste back to people, I could clean up the environment and create art at the same time.
Sourcing Waste
I sourced the waste garments from op shops, clothing recycling centres and personal donations to me. I teamed up with After ANZ and sorted through the garments they had in their warehouse. Seeing the thousands of tons of clothes baled up and ready to be shredded or shipped to other countries was astonishing. I realised there that the No Bull Cause couldn’t reclaim everything. The problem is something that has to be solved at the source.
When I get the clothes, I dye the garments black or blue to delete their previous pigments and some of their graphics. I then use custom silk screens to print the new, No Bull Cause designs onto them. Finally I relabel them with up to 3 labels each, a new size tag, a hem tag and a label with all the information of the brand.
Design
Every design referenced trash in some way. I took inspiration from Andy Warhol’s Factory when doing this, as of course, the designs would be mass printed.
Taking into account how these designs would be printed was very important. It set parameters. I settled on screen printing because it was the easiest to do at home, solo. It was also environmentally friendly as I could use natural fabric paints.
Screen printed images rely solely on contrast, so I had to produce designs that were either black or white, no gradients. This informed the style of No Bull. I used half toning to get photographs to show on the silk screens.
I wanted to maximise the amount of space I could work with on a single, A2, silk screen so I decided to make multiple smaller designs that I could print individually on the same screen.
Label Design
A big part of making this brand successful was building trust with the consumer. Trust is a detail driven response, so labels are very important. They communicate the brand where symbols cannot.
The No Bull Cause has multiple brand elements, The impossible shape, the construction lines logo and the brackets. These symbols communicate different functions of the brand.
I printed the labels with Dutch Label Shop on Cotton.
Final Clothes
I decided on a system of designs. Small, medium, large and extra large. It meant I could fill and leave as much space on the garment as I wanted. Each piece was wildly different from the next and mistakes in the printing process were celebrated. The before and after shots speak for themselves and were a big contributor to the brands success. I realised that people gained just as much pleasure, if not more, from seeing their old clothes be reimagined than they did from just buying a new garment.
I wanted to shoot the final photos on film. The screen printing process is very manual and has been done the same way for decades. I wanted the style and execution of the photography to pay homage to this. When using film, you have to think more and save your shots, it meant that I couldn’t photograph everything, only important moments and compositions.
The studio shots and flat lays of the clothing were done with a digital camera.
Photography: Mika Wilhelms & Felix Toohey
Featuring: Bella Chen, Marcus Saunders, Julian Risos, Felicia Nguyen, Bronte Orlander, Felix Toohey
Video
I wanted to create a compelling promotional video for No Bull. So I enlisted videographer and photographer, Mika Wilhems and the vocal talents of Thea Smith. My idea was to produce a music video featuring the clothes. I rewrote Melanie’s song, ‘Look What They’ve Done To My Song’ to have a more environmental swing. The irony of rewriting a song that’s about not wanting the song to change is not lost on me. Thea did a perfect job recording the song and the video came out as envisioned.
Video: Mika Wilhelms
Editing: Felix Toohey
Music: Thea Smith, Felix Toohey
Featuring: Bella Chen, Marcus Saunders, Felicia Nguyen, Bronte Orlander, Felix Toohey
Season 2
Following the success of my first round of designs, I decided to make more. This time to commemorate my first solo exhibition showing the No Bull designs.
You can find more information about the design and set up of the week-long exhibition, ‘Gift Shop’, in the Physical Spaces category.
As well as exclusive references to the exhibition I also wanted to show my appreciation for dogs, slightly deviating from the trash-centric designs I had done before, instead going for a more self-expressive angle.
Photography: Felix Toohey
Featuring: Hayley Gu, Marcus Saunders
No Bull Store
I designed a store concept, a tattoo parlour for clothes.
People bring in their clothes that they no longer use (instead of throwing them to landfill) they point out what design they would like added to their clothing to add value back. It's printed while they wait, re-branded and given back to them. No need to produce new clothes when there are millions sitting in peoples wardrobes at home.
You can find more information about the store in the ‘Physical Spaces’ page.
