WSU student turns textile scraps into wearable art

PULLMAN — When Kiah Conway first walked into a Washington State University storage room filled with hundreds of pounds of fabrics, remnants, and scraps, a sense of overwhelming possibility hit her hard. That hasn’t changed, even nearly a year later. “Every time I go into that room, I see why some of it has sat there so long,” said Conway, a junior double majoring in apparel design and merchandising. “But sometimes I find something that’s so gorgeous, I’m shocked to see it. The more you dig, the better it gets. It feels like scavenging, but you can find gold in there.” Conway recently created two garments, a dress and a jacket, using almost nothing but leftover material from the storage closet. The closet is full of donated fabrics and remnants, sewing supplies, and scrap materials from different student design projects in WSU’s Department of Apparel, Merchandising, Design, and Textiles. The materials are kept so they don’t go into landfills.