Textile Terrains: the hidden geographies of fashion overconsumption

Activists and experts in conversation on the environmental impacts of global second-hand clothing trade and pathways for change.

Presented as part of the PayPal Melbourne Fashion Festival’s Independent Programme, this panel will host an expert discussion with Professor Alice Payne and As/Prof Taylor Brydges (RMIT School of Fashion & Textiles), Danielle Kent (General Manager for Industry Transformation at Seamless, Australia's clothing product stewardship scheme), and Yayra Agbofah (The Revival, community-led sustainable design NGO based in Ghana) to discuss the environmental impacts of fashion overconsumption and actions that can inform policy and practice for meaningful and constructive change. Drawing on Landscape Architecture tools to visualise the depth of overconsumption and its disposal impacts, the discussion opens with an overview of the Textile Terrains project and its methodology for exposing hidden landscapes. Alongside the panel, an exhibition showcases mapping that reveals global second-hand clothing flows and environmental impacts of the international trade.

Meet the Panelists:

Professor Alice Payne (RMIT University)

Alice is the dean of the School of Fashion and Textiles at RMIT. Her research focuses on environmental and social sustainability issues throughout the life cycle of clothing. Recent work has examined labour issues in the cotton value chain, technologies to address the problem of textile waste, consumer practices for circularity, and circular design. Alice was part of the Australian Fashion Council-led consortium who designed the National Clothing Product Stewardship Scheme. She is author of the book Designing Fashion’s Future, co-editor of Global Perspectives on Sustainable Fashion, and is an award-winning designer and educator.

Associate Professor Taylor Brydges (RMIT University)

An economic geographer specialising in fashion systems, Taylor is an Associate Professor in the School of Fashion and Textiles at RMIT University and Director of the Weft Research Centre. She has led multi-year, multi-country research projects across three continents, working with academic, industry, government, and NGO partners. Her expertise spans sustainability and circularity in fashion and textiles, with a strong focus on cross-disciplinary and applied research.

Danielle Kent (Seamless, Australian Clothing Stewardship)

Danielle is the General Manager, Industry Transformation at Seamless. Seamless is a clothing stewardship scheme that aims to transform how clothing is made, used, reused and recycled in Australia to create clothing circularity by 2030. Danielle has extensive experience in strategy and complex change management as a consultant, and a full range of government experience as Director of the Secretariat to the Ministerial Committee for tertiary education. She has a postgraduate in Social Impact and helped establish the not for profit company, Impact Investing Australia, reporting to the G8 International Social Taskforce on Impact Investing. She fully appreciates the discipline and challenges of system transformation and is passionate about the Seamless vision for a circular Australian clothing economy.

Yayra Agbofah (The Revival, community-led sustainable design NGO based in Ghana)

Yayra Agbofah is a creative social entrepreneur based in Accra,Ghana. His collective and consultancy AfroDistrict tackles social and environmental issues through art, education and entrepreneurship. Launched in 2018, THE REVIVAL is a community-led initiative rooted in upcycling culture; an innovative and engaging way to manage global textile waste in West Africa.