Textile designer Alicia Rowbotham reimagines waste silk

A trip to industrial mills in Bradford proved pivotal for Alicia Rowbotham, while she was studying for her Textile Design BA at Central Saint Martins. ‘I felt an affinity with them because my great-grandfather used to own a textile mill there,’ says the 2019 graduate.

What struck her most, however, was the volume of waste produced. ‘The mills are centuries-old, so there’s a lack of infrastructure to reuse waste, and they told me it was cheaper to discard it than send it elsewhere.’ That inspired her to create her graduate collection entirely from waste silk from the mills.

She began by creating body adornments: colourful woven pieces with hanging tassels. She made these on arm looms, which are like ‘semi-computerised limbs’, as she puts it, enabling very detailed patterns. ‘The aim was to illustrate complex technical weaving and that waste could be luxurious,’ she adds.

Her gallerist, Vanja Bazdulj of London’s House on Mars, had an immediate instinct to put them on the wall. ‘I was intrigued by the weaving skill and mix of materials: silk and wood, and silk and wire,’ says Bazdulj. ‘The pieces were interesting examples of what 3D wall art could be.’ This helped Rowbotham realise her passion lay in textiles for domestic spaces.

For Collect art fair, running on Artsy.net until Wednesday 24 March, she is presenting a series of textile sculptures that riff on the extravagant tassel tie-backs that she was commissioned to make for the renovations of London’s Berkeley Hotel (completing this spring). The White Light collection comprises woven artworks with reclaimed silk fringing, and carved forms cast in aluminium, threaded with hand-spun ropes and silk.

While interior design commissions are now the bulk of her work – she is also creating woven privacy screens for all of the hotel’s suites – the art pieces challenge her practice. ‘You can only push commercial work so far, so I’m excited about the scale of the Collect commission and where I can take it,’ she adds.

Alongside the glittering names taking to Collect art fair’s digital stage is a range of debut acts from across the world. Throughout the fair (26 February – 24 March) we have been meeting the makers turning waste into wonders, giving traditional techniques fresh form and pushing 3D printing to new levels of refinement.