The 2021-2022 participants of the Trash the Runway program stand together on stage before being presented with awards at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Mackey Auditorium stage on Feb. 17, 2022. (Io Hartman/CU Independent)
Julia Olsen, a sixth-grade student at Manhattan Middle School, took the grand stage at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Macky Auditorium with style. She wore long, blonde bubble braids and an impressive handmade dress comprised of used candy wrappers, snack bags and fruit sleeves. As she bobbed her way to center stage, the runway show’s MC bent down slightly and lowered the microphone to her small face, decorated with tiny painted stars underneath her eyes. Standing less than five feet tall, adorned in glitter and rainbow packaging, she began to critique older generations’ pollution mistakes, younger generations’ climate inaction and global disregard for the planet’s welfare in an inspiring display of both courage and condemnation.
Trash the Runway held their annual trash-fashion runway show on Feb. 29. This show, a design competition run by the Creative Lab at the Common Threads consignment shop in Boulder, challenges elementary, middle and high school students from around Colorado to think critically about their environment, pollution and sustainability, and create dazzling couture garments out of trash. Articles of clothing (even thrifted ones), recyclables and compost are strictly prohibited – contestants may only use collected materials that would have otherwise headed to a landfill.
Kelle Boumansour, Trash the Runway’s production manager, said that while the creative process puts the issues at the forefront of their minds, the environmental knowledge and sustainability concerns the students present onstage are all their own. Many student designers marveled at how quickly they were able to accumulate enough trash for an entire garment in so little time.
“It took me one month to collect what I needed (for the dress), and I feel like it should have taken me like, a year,” said Olsen. “And they’re only two (kinds of snacks)! And I wonder, how much do we produce on a month(ly) basis?”
This year, notable entries included a billowing ball gown made out of an old patio umbrella, a formal maxi dress made of used baking paper from Boulder Valley School District cafeterias, and a reflective, ruffled blue prom dress made using a party banner that was found on a lawn close to home.
“It was outside of a sorority,” said Josie Eckert, the dress’ designer and a freshman at Watershed High School. “My mom works at CU, and she had seen it there for a while.”
Tanja Leonard, executive director of Trash the Runway and manager of the Creative Lab, says that their six-week program merely assists the designers while transferring their ideas from sketches to runway-ready clothing. She said the creativity and ingenuity of each design is original.
“We don’t really teach as much as we help them get their creations out of their heads,” Leonard said. “If they have problems with their materials, how to put them together, how to sew them, if they have problems with the fit, like they’re picturing it to fit differently, we help them with that — but they do everything.”
Finn Thompson, an eleventh grade student at New Vista High School, wore a soft, puffy outfit made of tea bags and dryer sheets. He is a two-time participant in Trash the Runway and this year’s runner-up in the high school category. He noted that while the Creative Labs mentors were a huge help during the creation of his garments, their assistance never went beyond the technical.
“I started just kind of on my own, I was always interested in design and fashion, so I just started taking classes a few years ago,” Thompson said. “Sewing together a thousand tea bags is not fun, but I learned the process of drafting a pattern, which is really important, and altering looks… I learned a lot.”
Trash the Runway’s hands-off approach lends credence to the claim that young students across Colorado are independently concerned about both the climate and sustainable fashion. Each of the show’s 43 designers, ranging in age from early elementary school to their senior year of high school, are passionate about sustainability and making a difference in their environment outside of the classroom. The problem here is that even though many of Colorado’s young people have the determination and dedication required to spread awareness, saving the planet shouldn’t be the sole responsibility of those not yet old enough to vote.
“For them, it means so much. Your generation, their generation… you guys are living it. It’s going to impact your lives in such a huge way,” said Libby Alexander, co-owner of Common Threads and creator of the Creative Lab program, after the show. “It’s about community, and having the kids learn so much about sustainability.”
“I want people to know we need to fight. It’s not, ‘We can wait ‘till tomorrow,’” Olsen said. “We need to do this now, because every single second the world gets worse. And this Earth is a beautiful place, and we need to keep it beautiful instead of contaminated.”
Contact CU Independent Arts and Entertainment Editor Grace Ptak at Grace.Ptak@colorado.edu.
