Recap: Global Fashioning Assembly 2024

The Lowlands Decolonial Fashion Network (LDFN), consisting of FASHIONCLASH, the Linen Project, Crafts Council Nederland, Tailors & Wearers and the Research Collective for Decoloniality & Fashion, organized a participatory conversation ‘What decoloniality means in a Dutch Context?’ as part of the Global Fashioning Assembly 2024 program.

On 11 October 2024, people could join in-person at the Jan van Eyck Academie in Maastricht, while others were welcomed to join the conversation online to reflect on these questions and topics while putting the hands to apply needlework on a textile cloth that was created during the residency.

About the Dutch hosting communities

FASHIONCLASH is a development and presentation platform for fashion (culture) that contributes through crossovers to, on the one hand, the individual talent development of the new generation of fashion makers and, on the other hand, to general awareness of the role of fashion in the world. Established in 2009, FASHIONCLASH initiates, produces and presents work of a new generation of fashion practitioners who research, reflect, contextualize and celebrate contemporary fashion(culture). FASHIONCLASH believes passionately in the positive contribution the art of fashion can make to personal and artistic development, identity building, society, culture and economy.

THE LINEN PROJECT investigates since 2018 and works towards reactivating the economic viability of small- scale local flax cultivation and linen production in the Netherlands. It seeks to reinstate the economy as a social, ecological and cultural domain and to strengthen socio-economic patterns and behaviours rooted in a commoning approach. The inherent connections between (cultural) heritage, education, agriculture, design, crafts, and the economy are activated as well as the exchange of diverse values, knowledge, skills and competencies.

THE CRAFTS COUNCIL NEDERLAND (CCNL), founded in 2012, contributes to the development of crafts and the creative crafts culture in the Netherlands. CCNL is the initiator of a great and growing community of craftsman, museums and educational institutions, economy and government. Each party involved builds a link in the transition to a new form of meaning within the sector. Crafts knowledge belongs to the intangible heritage which gets transferred from person to person. Connecting people who still have this knowledge and people who want learn from it, is the natural result of our work.

TAILORS & WEARERS looks at Afro-Surinamese costume through the lens of craft, anthropology and photography. The purpose of the foundation is to research and preserve, present and provide education regarding Afro-Surinamese costumes. We do this by collecting and sharing knowledge, such as organizing events, meetings and presentations, creating educational material, providing workshops and acting as a knowledge platform, online and oNline, for interested parties and heritage practitioners.

RESEARCH COLLECTIVE ON DECOLONIALITY & FASHION (RCDF) is an experimental platform beyond institutional, disciplinary and geographical boundaries initiated in 2012. It aims to critique the denial and erasure of a diversity of fashioning systems due to eurocentricity, unequal global power relations based on the modern-colonial order and the Euro-American canon of normativity materialised in modern aesthetics. Transcending academe, the Collective aims to experiment with decentral and decolonial ways of knowledge-creation and sharing concerning fashion.

About Global Fashioning Assembly

The biennial Global Fashioning Assembly (GFA), with a first edition in 2022, is a unique online gathering of local fashion communities from all over the world to decenter and decolonise knowledge creation and sharing of body fashioning practices and heritages.

Rather than the event hosting participants, the participants pass on the hosting of the event to ensure self-representation, -determination and governance. Its main aim is to disrupt western-centric international fashion gatherings that often operate as gatekeepers to justify and perpetuate excluding and discriminating logics and validate English-centred knowledge.

Sparked by the grassroots-to-global possibilities of the digital, it goes beyond the limitation of one singular physical presentation, by bringing together a diversity of experiences, knowledges and cultural heritages by a diversity of institutes and communities that self- represent and self-narrate their cultural heritage. The decentralised format is inspired by around-the-world assemblies through which communities share in their own pathways to a politics of wholeness based on the principle that ’we can’t solve our crises using the same way of thinking that created them’ (Grassroots2Global).

Underpinning the GFA are collective ideation, decision-making and execution. Preparations take two years with the hosting communities meeting (bi)monthly to formulate the overall conceptual framework, thematic scopes, hosting communities, planning, budgeting and funding. Tasks are divided organically with smaller groups taking on different responsibilities (planning, budgeting, communication & production) according to the principle ‘by the communities, for the communities.’ Simultaneously, each hosting community decides on their own programme, content(s), format(s), language(s), aesthetics and participants according to its specific experiences and needs.

It is a uniquely innovative and impactful approach about living cultures, craft heritages and fashion knowledges that welcomes a wide diversity of voices and formats. Each hosting community welcomes local stakeholders, communities and audiences, on and offline, in a combination of local languages and English. By using a shared language of ‘fashioning’, the GFA aims to:

• Create a hosting environment that is decentred, inclusive and co-created;

• Debunk the myth that the contemporary design and art is global, inclusive and for everyone;

• Demonstrate pluriversal craft heritages and living fashioning systems beyond the western paradigm;

• Bring attention to creative ecosystems that consider planet and people over profit;

• Raise awareness of the violence of the contemporary collections & the creative economy;

• Promote a just transition to ethical, regenerative and fair creative practices; and

• Foster counter-strategies against polarisation through art, design, fashion and culture.

For the GFA24, 20 communities in 26 countries, across 6 continents, are hosting between 1- 20 October 2024, for a total of 40 hours of local programming and 20 hours of Sharing Councils at different times to accommodate their local time zones. Programmes address practical approaches to decoloniality in everyday life, exploring the tensions and challenges that arise when design and craft intersect in their local contexts. How to use creative resistance to challenge capitalist, colonial, Euro-centric, anthropocentric, and patriarchal systems of design and education through sustainable, ethical, slow, ecofeminist, decolonial, and circular approaches to fashion?

Program

ABYA YALA Coalition (Latin America)
Tuesday 1 October, 2:30pm UTC+2

'Imagining a decentralised footwear industry' by Cobbled Goods (Canada)
Friday 4 October, 10:00am UTC+2

Reclaiming Community Practices: From Fashion Industry To Fashion Commons by Fashion Act Now (UK)
Saturday 5 October, 10:00am UTC+2

'Kazakh Fashion & Arts: Identity Sandwich' (Kazakhstan)
Wednesday 9 October, 2:00pm UTC+2

UN/FOLDING_RE/FOLDING_FOLDED: Imiphindo kwaXhosa Season 2 - by African Fashion Research Institute (South-Africa)
Thursday 10 October, 1:00pm UTC+2

'Fighting Fascism Through Fashion, Hacking White Supremacy' by the Austrian Center for Fashion Research (Austria)
Friday 11 October, 11:00am UTC+2

'What Does Decoloniality Mean in a Dutch Context?' by the Lowlands Decolonial Fashion Network (Netherlands)
Friday 11 October, 3:00pm UTC+2

DRESS AND BECOME (Chile)
Saturday 12 October, 6:00pm UTC+2

SEWING A GREENER FUTURE FOR GHANA by GiFt (Ghana)
Sunday 13 October, 4:00pm UTC+2

'Evolution of Ancestral Jewelry' by OwnYourCulture (Kenya)
Tuesday 15 October, 2:00pm UTC+2

'Design Magic Through Craft: Textile Alchemy' by Witches of the East Collective(Turkey)
Wednesday 16 October, 4:00pm UTC+2

Mendit Research Lab (Russia)
Thursday 17 October, 11:00am UTC+2

Hui Auaha o Aotearoa - Open Day at the New Zealand Fashion Museum (Aotearoa)
Saturday 19 October, 8:00am UTC+2

Decolonial Fashion and Design: A Global South in Portuguese-speaking (Brasil)
Saturday 19 October, 5:00pm UTC+2

Stitching Stories - Kheta In The Classroom (India)
Sunday 20 October, 12:00pm UTC+2

‘Not in Vogue: Decentering Fashion Narratives in Flanders’ by Losse Draadjes Collective (Belgium)
Monday 21 October, 1:00pm UTC+2

‘Needle and Thread – A Soft Discourse’ by Center for Research of Fashion and Clothing (Croatia)
Tuesday 22 October, 7:00pm UTC+2

Apnaiyat Pakistan Collective (Pakistan)
Friday 25 October, 3:00pm UTC+2

'An Angolan Decolonial Performance' by Fashion + Urban Art (Angola) Saturday 26 October, 8:00pm UTC+2

"Our OLLA is not YOUR OLLA" by Fashion Liberation Collective North Africa
Monday 28 October, 3:00pm UTC+1

Impressions of the event at Jan van Eyk Academy

Field trips: Lowlands Decolonial Fashion Network

As part of the Decolonial Residency organized by the Lowlands Decolonial Fashion Network (LDNF) network, four thought-provoking field trips were held throughout 2024, each exploring key aspects of decoloniality in relation to fashion, culture, and local resources.

In June 2024, The Linen Project invited fellow network members for a one-day field trip to a flax field in Arnhem. This excursion focused on exploring the role of local resources and indigenous knowledge systems in addressing contemporary issues. The visit provided participants with a deeper understanding of sustainable practices and how historical local knowledge can inform current solutions.

Followed by The Linen Project, FASHIONCLASH hosted a one-week residency in which ten fashion practitioners delved into questions of decoloniality, both in the Dutch context and specifically within fashion. The residency encouraged deep reflection on colonial legacies and their impact on the fashion industry today. During one of the days of the program, LDNF network representatives visitied Maastricht and joined the conversation with the Decolonial Residency participants.

In August 2024, Tailors & Wearers (T&W) commissioned three designers to “rethink” the Surinamese angisa, encouraging a critical examination of cultural heritage through a decolonial lens. Network members visited T&W and engaged with the designers to reflect on their creative processes and research, providing insights into the ways in which fashion can challenge and reshape narratives of cultural identity.

Finally, in early September 2024, Crafts Council Nederland organized an afternoon dedicated to Dutch crafting practices. This event explored the importance of embodied knowledge, community building, and intergenerational transmission of skills, offering a deeper understanding of how traditional crafts can play a role in decolonial practices.

The overall process of coordinating these field trips and discussions was led by the Research Collective for Decoloniality & Fashion (RCDF), with a focus on promoting dialogue, reflection, and collaboration within the Dutch hosting of the Global Fashioning Assembly 2024 (GFA24).

These field trips provided valuable spaces for reflection and conversation, offering participants a richer understanding of how decolonial practices can be applied in various creative and cultural contexts.