Monica Lake | Lariat Photographer
By Kate McGuire
Staff Writer
Green wasn’t just a color Thursday at Common Grounds.
Houston junior Eliza Coleman and Plano junior Ryan Schaap designed two “green” outfits for the Project Greenway fashion show at 7 p.m. Thursday. The pair won the competition and received a $500 prize.
Project Greenway is a fashion show and concert sponsored by Uproar Records, Baylor’s student-run record label.
It consists of fashion designer teams that work over the course of four months to design and create recyclable outfits that depict “green” materials. All outfits consisted of recyclable materials such as newspaper, cardboard, plastic bottles and more.
Crandall junior Jodi Orr, director of Project Greenway said, all materials have to be recyclable and Baylor appropriate.
Coleman and Schaap said they were excited about the night but didn’t know what to expect.
“We didn’t have any expectations going in but we were confident,” Schaap said. “We were definitely nervous and the other teams did a really good job.”
The dresses were judged by a panel of judges representing Baylor Sustainability, Common Grounds, Uproar Records and Baylor family and consumer science department. Criteria for judges included amount of recyclable material, creativity, and appeal of the design and wearabilty of the outfit.
Altogether there were three teams that created four dresses total. The winning team consisted of two friends, Coleman and Schaap, who designed and created two dresses. The first dress was black with an umbrella for the bosom, broken records on the hips, an intertube for the waist and plastic sheeting and lining for the flowy skirt. Their second dress was made of blue camping tarp, and broken CDs around the waist, up the bosom and around the neck.
Inspiration for the different outfits came from Pinterest, fashion magazines and personal items around rooms and apartments.
Schaap said he got his inspiration for the designs from big-name designers in his magazines.
“I am a magazine hoarder, so we went through all the magazines, and we saw Dior and Alexander McQueen,” Schaap said. “Sitting down and doing research was really fun.”
One of the teams included three designers who were paired up by Project Greenway.
Spring freshman Jasmine Miller, Chino Hills, Calif., graduate student Holly Smith, and Norcross, Ga., sophomore Laura Beth Hooper created a dress made mostly of newspaper but the trio didn’t stop at a dress. Their sandals were made out of cardboard and paper mache newspaper. Miller said accessories consisted of melted plastic bottles for earrings and a belt made out of shopping bags.
Kingwood senior Krista Stephens worked alone. She designed, created and modeled a dress made of packing paper, burlap, medical tape, coffee filters and peacock feathers.
Stephens said she wanted an outfit that is functional as well as environmentally friendly.
“I wanted to create a dress people would look at and say, ‘I want that,’” Stephens said.
Sponsors of Project Greenway included Baylor Sustainability, student government, the Baylor Lariat, Uproar Records and Common Grounds.
Uproar artists also performed at the event. Dreamboat performed at the beginning of the night before the fashion show and then Lane Lynch ended the show.
The “going-green attitude” was furthered when Common Grounds announced its transition from using Styrofoam cups to compostable cups, as well as adding three recycling bins, Orr said.
Common Grounds also began offering a new drink, the Treehugger. A dollar from every purchase of the drink will go to Keep Waco Beautiful, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to keep Waco clean, healthy, and safe through green programs said Sherri Street, executive director of Keep Waco Beautiful.
