Assistant Professor Alejandra Ruiz, M. F. A. ‘ 23, is using vegetables to turn fast-fashion misuse into recyclable, eco-friendly materials.
By 2015, Ruiz said quick fashion, the mass production of low-cost clothes, led to the annual production of 120 billion pieces of clothing, 15-20 % of which went to waste. Most discarded things from the United States and other consumer-driven markets are sent to areas of Latin America, Asia, and Africa for removal.
Think how many of those 120 billion things will be discarded in these developing nations in a year, Ruiz said.
De observed the effects of discarded clothing from fast-paced areas in Chile and Colombia while pursuing her undergraduate studies in fashion style.
” When I ventured into supplies style, I found fresh questions and comprehensive difficulties”, Ruiz said. I started looking into what happens to clothes after people buy them because I was n’t comfortable with the fashion system.
Ruiz began to wonder how to use textile waste to produce innovative supplies without having a negative impact on the environment and people around the world. Ruiz began pursuing a graduate education in style at UC Davis in 2021. She conducted studies in biodesign, which included identifying new methods of waste, reducing and breaking down textile spare using mushroom, the root-like framework of mushrooms.
Her in-depth research in this area led to the exclusive Savageau Award at the time of her completion, which was civically supported by UC Davis Design Professor Emeriti Ann Savageau.
The way to technology
To make MycoTextile Future, an award-winning, multidisciplinary job, Ruiz collaborated with UC Davis Design Professor Christina Cogdell and Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Professor Valeria La Saponara to explore possible applications of mushroom in business.
Living mycelium is used by MycoTextile Futures to transform agricultural waste and discarded clothing into functional building materials like mycelium brick. These materials can be reused numerous times before breaking down the artificial cotton fibers and later bringing them back to the soil.
Ruiz’s goal of turning spend into a reference, which has won him a research award from the global Future is Fungi competition, led to the creation of MycoTextile Futures. The project has been accepted for the Green Initiative Fund at UC Davis, a system that provides grants to faculty, staff, and students to showcase projects on campus and sustainable development.
The interdisciplinar nature of the layout program was one of the things I liked about working on this project, Ruiz said. ” To be the architect and to be able to interact with all these different approaches to information is so great.”
How can we create products from this cotton waste without putting a strain on the environment and its citizens? “- Alejandra Ruiz, M. F. A. ‘ 23
Award-winning job
Ruiz’s college installation”, Green Pathways for Repurposing Textile Waste, “was granted the 2023 Savageau Award, which supported Ruiz’s change from graduate college to her present position as an assistant teacher.
This prestigious award recognizes the accomplishments of a M. F. A. style student who graduated and encourages creativity in the program. Ruiz’s labor was exhibited at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art’s ceremony opening celebration of the annual Arts and Humanities Graduate Exhibition.
Savageau said she and Ruiz share a similar creativity, passion, and determination to positively impacting the world of style, and that Ruiz’s commitment to sustainable fabric design was attracted her attention.
” Alejandra’s function with mycelium is really quite outstanding and initial,” Savageau said”. It is very detailed, and it has a significant economic and social effects on the job she is putting forth. She is undoubtedly a rising star in mushroom research and green design.
Weaving a green coming
Ruiz is currently focusing on addressing pressing problems in the fashion and textile industries, envisioning a responsible and sustainable future for the garments manufacturing sector. De advocates for conservation through education in her capacity as an associate professor at UC Davis. When she is n’t teaching, the designer interacts with industry experts on the issues of conscious consumption, green design knowledge, and spare reclamation on a national and international level.
” In the future, I would like to continue my research on grain fermentation and the potential for using textile waste to produce biodegradable new materials for green equipment,” Ruiz said. I believe that to try to work with nature to develop products that can be used to enhance people’s life, is a must.
To learn more about Ruiz’s work, visit https ://www .hello-alegria.com/