ReFashioning Futures

This subtheme explores how new, mixed and creative research methods can challenge traditional academic approaches and open up different ways of understanding fashion. It welcomes practice‑led, sensory, speculative, narrative and future‑focused methods that help us rethink materials, systems, cultures and identities.

Questions that may guide submissions:

• How can creative and critical research methods challenge the dominant stories we tell about how fashion is made, used and valued?
• How can speculative or experimental approaches help us imagine more sustainable or regenerative fashion futures?
• How can participatory, community‑led or decolonial methods change the way we carry out fashion research?

A focus on circularity, regeneration and the environmental and social systems that shape fashion. Submissions may examine how materials, behaviours, infrastructures, policies, economic structures and cultural practices can support low impact, restorative and equitable fashion futures.

Questions that may guide submissions:

• How can research help shift fashion from a linear model towards regenerative, circular and socially just systems?
• What environmental, cultural, economic or structural barriers limit the adoption of circular and regenerative practices, and how might you propose creative ways to address them?
• How can repair, reuse, thrift, local production, cooperative models or community based practices influence mainstream fashion and shift how clothing is valued?
• How can design decisions (materials, processes, construction, repairability, disassembly) contribute to more circular and regenerative fashion futures

This subtheme examines how digitalisation, virtual environments, AI enabled tools and new media are reconfiguring fashion practice, business models, creative expression and consumer engagement. It welcomes both critical and practice‑led work that examines the opportunities, challenges and social implications of emerging digital technologies

Questions that may guide submissions:

• How can digital tools enable more democratic, accessible or participatory fashion futures?
• What are the impacts of virtual fashion, AI‑driven creativity, digital prototyping or immersive technologies on sustainability, labour and social equity?
• How might ecological knowledge, craft traditions or local cultural practices connect with digital innovation to create new forms of hybrid design?

This subtheme foregrounds the social, cultural and political dimensions of fashion. It explores how identities, communities, intergenerational knowledge and global cultural narratives influence how fashion is made, used and valued. It welcomes work examining diversity, inclusion, wellbeing, heritage, alternative lifestyles and collective forms of fashion engagement.

Questions that may guide submissions:

• How can cultural storytelling and communal practices shape alternative fashion futures?
• What can we learn from communities already practising sustainable or low consumption lifestyles?
• How can local cultural knowledge and global connectivity work together to build socially just fashion systems?

Extended abstracts should outline original academic or practice-led research aligned with the conference subthemes. Selected authors will deliver a 10 minute presentation followed by 10 minutes of Q and A, either in person or online.

Work in progress submissions are strongly encouraged. Students at any stage of their project may present early ideas, developmental work, or emerging insights. The conference provides a supportive environment for constructive peer and professional feedback.

Publication Opportunity: Please note here will be opportunities to submit a full paper on your research to special issues of one international fashion sustainability journal after the conference.

We welcome a diverse range of digital, material, performative and screen-based creative submissions. All accepted creative work will be showcased during a dedicated creative session, with options for both in person and online display formats.

Posters will be included in an interactive session, with opportunities for both in-person and online poster presentations to engage with delegates. Online presenters will be allocated a virtual discussion slot during the poster session.

• Explain what issue, question or topic your research addresses.
• If work in progress: describe the emerging focus or the problem area you are beginning to explore.

• List your key research question(s)(and hypothesis if quantitative)
• If you are still developing: present your current working questions or the direction your questions are taking.

• Outline the theories, concepts, debates or literature shaping your work.
• If still forming: identify the initial theoretical ideas or thinkers you are considering.

• Explain how you are conducting (or plan to conduct) your research.
• If you are in early stages: describe your proposed methods, pilot work, or methodological approach under consideration.

• For completed or near completed research, share key findings.

For work in progress:

• present early observations,
• initial themes,
• insights from pilot testing,
• reflections from ongoing making, prototyping or fieldwork, or
• expected directions.

The aim is not to present finished results but to show how the project is developing.

• Explain the relevance and contribution of your research, why it matters.
• If work in progress: reflect on your expected contribution or the potential significance of your emerging work.

Do Include any key texts that inform your abstract

Please prepare a PowerPoint or pdf presentation suitable to be presented within a 10 minute timeframe as part of one of the conference tracks. Please note here will be an opportunity to submit a full paper on your research to special issues of one international fashion sustainability journal after the conference.

Please submit your poster as a single digital file, following the specifications below. Posters will be displayed physically/digitally throughout the conference, ensuring accessibility for both in‑person and online participants.

• Format: A1 dimensions (84.1cm x 59.4cm), landscape orientation, saved as a PDF (maximum file size: 200MB).
• Resolution: Minimum 300dpi to ensure clear and high‑quality viewing on screens and digital displays.
• Content: Include the poster title, author name(s), institutional affiliation(s), and all relevant text, visuals, images or diagrams needed to communicate your project effectively.