7ab Erasmus+ return visit from Slovenia - Creating our new sustainable fashion accessory

7ab Erasmus+ return visit from Slovenia
Creating our new sustainable fashion accessory
After two full days of programming on the topic of sustainability, all the students from the Slovenian partner school and our year 7 classes finally found themselves at our school.
In the late afternoon on Friday 24.3.23 some of the Slovenians had a small tour of the school, but most of them were exhausted from the long day. After a well-deserved break both we and the Slovenians were allowed to choose whether to learn "Schuachplattln" or to dye jute bags. All the Slovenes and a few of our students chose dyeing the bags. This took place in the chemistry classroom with Prof. Plankensteiner, Prowatke, Widmann and Lechner.
The artists of our class had already prepared the jute bags a few days before by tying them together into different shapes with twine to create unique textures and motives. Now each of us was allowed to choose a tied bag and then the big dyeing session began. The kettles were filled, and the water was heated, which took ages. Then the heated water was poured into different buckets and a spoonful of salt and the colours - black, olive green, red, ultramarine blue, magenta, yellow - were added as well. When the colours were finally ready and everyone had chosen their colour of choice for their bag, the jute bags were dunked into the buckets. From then on it was just a matter of stirring well and waiting.
After about 35 minutes of dyeing, the students took out their bags from the bucket and hung them up on strings. The strings were hung between the tables of the chemistry classroom. Towels and newspapers were placed under them so that the school floor would not be coloured and ruined with the dye. Now we had to wait and look forward to the jute bags!
The result of the bags was impressive, and many unique colours and patterns were created. The Slovenian students received their bags by post a few days later as the drying process took a couple of days.
Dyeing the jute bags was a great project for the students to let their creativity run free and to relax a bit after an exhausting day of program.

Text: Ella Scherzer & Mia Kurtusic, 7a
Fotos: Ilka Prowatke, Irena Sladič (SLO)