Originally published at: Woman makes full length gown entirely out of plastic Target bags | Boing Boing
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Good for her. It’s not a dress I find attractive, but if she likes it and it helps sell her channel, great. Seems like it was a lot of work, and she did what she set out to do, which is always impressive.
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I’ve crocheted grocery totes with plastic yarn, it’s not something I care to do in the summer, too hot to work with. Wool is less irritating.
I am now reminded that I have about half of a plastic bag bag in the front hall closet. Suppose I should get on that as the weather gets cooler.
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I kind of expected it to be transformed a bit more, into something that did not just look like a mess of Target bags.
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should have been titled “Tarjay” bags 
Maybe she’s not a Minnesotan?
Yeah, I call bullshit.
This looks like a partnership to me.
I’m surprised people see this reflecting positively on Target. It’s great to re-use plastic crap if you’re already stuck with it. But isn’t having 170 plastic bags from a single retailer just highlighting the negative environmental impact of all the plastic our society wastes? I don’t think I’d want my brand associated like that.
If she had made the dress from tattered canvas shopping bags that had served her for many years, I’d be proud to have my logo stamped on those.
Haute Trash has been a thing for many years… here’s some designers that have led the way: Designers – Haute Trash
A quote from Haute Trash - Planet or Plastic - 30 Years of Trash Fashion - Paul Emery Music gives a little historical perspective - “Haute Trash is a social commentary satire, as it examines the wastefulness of the American culture and stresses the potential for recycling every day throw away items into one-of-a-kind fashions. The designers of Haute Trash are ecologically-minded artists who have chose to use fashion as a statement to encourage people to think twice about their trash.”
Their fashion shows are fabulous btw. Catch one if you can.
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Unfortunately, plastic bags are a matter of economics.
According to People Who Know These Things, plastic bags are cheaper than paper mostly because they save on shipping costs. Supposedly the weight, bulk, and time spent handling an equivalent amount of paper bags makes paper cost more per bag than plastic.
Even if the difference was a penny per bag, that’s literally millions of dollars per year at a company as large as Target. Not that Target couldn’t afford it, but the person in charge of bag expenses is unlikely to make the decision on their own to spend millions of extra dollars for paper bags, especially when that affects everything from trucking logistics to where a store is supposed to stock their cartons of extra paper bags that are now 50 times larger than the boxes of plastic bags. That’s the kind of decision that goes all the way up to the top.
That said, Target recently announced a huge push towards “sustainability”.. This includes multiple efforts including signing on to “The New Plastics Economy” whose corporate members pledge to eliminate plastics wherever possible, redesign to reduce plastics, and to recycle 100% of the plastics that remain.
( I have no way of knowing for sure that it’s a legitimate organization, but it’s sponsored by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, who also sponsors the Plastic Pollution Treaty that is also co-sponsored by the WWF. Their manifesto is a “call on United Nations member states to commit to the development of a global treaty on plastic pollution.”)
So the effort seems legit – but we’re still getting plastic bags from Target.
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