Register for the Zoom Discussion

The second session of TRLN’s Remote Rap Sessions will be about the documentary The Next Black – A film about the future of clothing. The documentary is freely available for streaming on YouTube. Registration helps with our planning and is much appreciated. You can register before and during the discussion and will receive the meeting link as soon as you register.

The Next Black is a documentary that brings together designers, innovators and leaders from around the globe for an open discussion on the concept of clothing. It probes beyond what we are wearing to explore how we produce clothes, how we interact with them and how we care for them. Each person we interviewed has a fresh perspective on the future of the clothing industry – and all of them are using their passions to fuel change.

Tali Brennan, Consultant, Sustainability, Energy and Climate Change for WSP USA (and graduate of Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment), Adam Rogers, NC State Libraries Head of Making and Innovation Studio, and Greg Tourino, NC State Libraries Lead Librarian for Textiles & Engineering Research will co-facilitate this discussion. We hope you can join us and please reach out to events@trln.org with any questions!

Discussion questions:

1. What’s one thing you found interesting about The Next Black?
2. What can you do as an individual to support sustainable clothing?
3. What textiles/brands/innovations can you think of that practice sustainable clothing techniques?
4. What role do you see companies playing to change the fashion industry? What impact can companies have? Do consumers have to change first?
5. The film shows increased innovation and sustainability in the fashion industry in recent years. How might the Covid outbreak affect that progress?
6. Is technology in fashion a scalable concept? 
7. How can libraries be more sustainable?
8. What topics in The Next Black resonated with our work in libraries? 
9. How can maker spaces adopt and support sustainable techniques?

Suggested Resources:

• Textile Exchange: https://textileexchange.org/
• Sustainable Apparel Coalition: https://apparelcoalition.org/
• Patagonia’s Activism: https://www.patagonia.com/activism/
• Art’s Work: Genetic Futures exhibit (featuring Kerasynth garment using synthetically grown biological fibers)
• Art2Wear at NC State (& Inside Art2Wear events)
• FTD Emerging Designers Showcase
• NC State’s Special Collections in Textiles & Digitized Photos
• NC State’s Wilson College of Textiles 
• A Necessary Filter: Nonwovens Institute Steps Up to Combat COVID-19
• From Hillsborough to Hunt: 65 Years of History at the Burlington Textiles Library

We hope you can join us and please reach out to events@trln.org with any questions!