by Mary-Devon Dupuy

Today at the Ogden, some of New Orleans’ most creative young people got a chance to strut on the catwalk wearing their own custom pieces. The Museum’s Fashion Camp came to a close with the fashion show “Up-Cycled.” The event featured the work of fourteen kids that repurposed items like post-its, grocery bags, old gum wrappers and the Times-Picayune. They turned would-have-been waste into fashion that was anything but trashy.

Native New Orleanian and Parsons School of Design Grad Veronica Cho mentored the young designers, and she praised her students for their creativity.

“They had big ideas, they stretched my notions of aesthetics,” Cho said in her introduction. Cho also said that each girl customized her piece to her own measurements rather than draping clothes on commercially sized dress forms (mannequins).

Cho was impressed by the girls’ natural talents. “Many draped garments with no background in draping or sewing,” Cho said.

The fourteen resourceful youngsters ranged in age from thirteen to sixteen, and they used everything from newspapers to old instruments to construct their pieces. Grayson Gold made a strapless, knee-length dress complete with a billowing train entirely from old Times-Picayune newspapers, and you can see the young woman wearing his design pictured above. Another designer turned grocery bags into a tutu-esque skirt that spun effortlessly with her on the runway.

Miranda Beck-Bird graced the runway in her couture piece constructed from an old raincoat, bottle caps, coffee straws, and real guitar strings. The aspiring costume designer said that Cho was, “Really great. She taught me a lot.”