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Photos by Ally Schmaling
Makeup by Marisol Chupas
How do the processes of making and wearing shape the body?
All textiles developed and made by hand from secondhand, waste, and locally sourced materials. Created to honor the legacy of the materials, the hands who have historically used them, and in exploration of the many factors industrially and at home which have brought my relationship with clothing to fruition. This collection is heavily research based and was supported by the Aronowitz Award, $1,000 granted to one rising senior.
My flatbed knit wire technique is foreign to the eye and hand. It bears the memory of the hand and machine that arrange it, but shines like precious metal. The fashion labor force and hands behind our industry are equally held with sustainable materiality.
A five look thesis collection, presented at the For The Public MassArt Runway Show, May 16, 2026.
The Self Portrait
An image of my hunchback from long hours at the machine, chronic wrist pain, and my gender as it has developed with my sense of self.
Hunchback Vest - raw wool wet felted with embedded brass knitting and silk. Mimics my inflamed shoulders from the processes used to make the piece. Lined with secondhand poly blend.
Brace Lace Sleeves - Knit wire lace, made on a domestic flatbed knitting machine in brass.
Skant - Somewhere between skirt and pant, provocatively placed pockets draw attention and embarrassment, with a panty line yoke. Secondhand raw silk.
Lace Mask - Machine knit lace, in brass wire.
The Natural Homemaker
An elaboration on domestic homemaking processes, intimacy, and my mother's first home knitting projects.
Shrunken Sweater - Nuno felted secondhand silk with raw wool creates a shrunken effect, with 'bursting' slot seams in machine-knit brass wire. The sweater is old, shrunken, worn out.
Skeletal Twined Bodice - Taken from the yoke of a sweater my mother knit, using basketry techniques to create a skeletal structure wrapped in strips of fraying fabric. This exposes process and the body, bringing you to a place of intimacy, forcing you to consider public and private, what it means to understand how to make.
Backstrap Trousers - Slot seams in brass wire bear the visual weight of the backstrap loom, reminding the wearer of the first technology women have had attached to their bodies for millenia. Secondhand rayon and brass.
Pelt Shawl - Constructed with basketry techniques in fiber rush, boning, secondhand silk, and surplus wool insulation. Inspired by the calash, a garment used for protection and to signal protests on the factory floor. In its heavy and insulating character it becomes the legacy of the wool industry for you to feel surrounding you.
Wound Up In The Machine
Merging operator and tool, she is trapped in the decaying machine she uses. The repetitive motions of her work are second nature. For every girl who has suffered in the movement for textile workers' labor rights.
Fair Isle Sweater - Fully fashioned in secondhand mercerized cotton and brass, inspired by the acute visual repetition in threaded machinery across vast factories. She is revealed as she is trapped inside.
Linker Skirt - The machine surrounding her. Made using a textile developed with broken knitting machine needles in secondhand moiré, naturally dyed with rust and coffee. Featuring an armadillo pocket, radiating darts, and metal hooping in the hem.
Tuck Stitch Stockings - Fully fashioned stirrup stockings inspired by 17th century french machine-knit stockings. The very piece she is making.
Still, Somwhere Else, Today
This painful history and material legacy isn't over, it's just out of sight. The naturalization paradigm devalues these textile skills, making our labor cheap and replaceable. We are trapped in this vicious cycle, trying to keep up with the machines that control us. The imprint of the machines is on our skin. She is a Venus figure, taken from ancient sculpture and rendered in her own trap, materials sourced and labor exploited globally.
Screen Bodice - Secondhand slub silk bodice, rust dyed with knitting machine needles. Fully fashioned i-cord lacing and brass knit screen obscures and imprisons the wearer.
Venus Hip Miniskirt - Secondhand moiré, stuffed with surplus wool insulation.
Winding Skirt - Secondhand slub silk, rust dyed with knitting machine needles. Spiral seams root her and hold her down.
Digital Chatelaine
The growing divide between maker and owner further separates craft and art, maker and user, us from each other. The loosening of traditions and rise of online communities are a hopeful force against planned obsolescence, the loss of skilled labor, and alienation.
Chatelaine Gown - nuno-felted deadstock silk, with wings that reach out towards other digital etherealities, machine-knit brass hip inserts that reveal the body, and a brass knit plunging back.
Kisslock Purse - Found hardware, brass and mohair, machine knit. To carry hope and connection, one link of the chatelaine.
Knit Pendant - cold-set riveted brass, handmade jump rings, and machine knit brass wire.
Wool Shoes and Socks - fully fashioned tuck-stitch socks, secondhand shoes covered with nuno-felted silk.
Lace Hairpiece - cloche machine knit lace, protecting and sending out signals.
Lace Mask - machine knit lace, in brass wire.
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