In March of 2024, project CUE-T (cycora® uniform explorer team) commenced. To put our circular cycora® material to the ultimate test of durability and resilience, we partnered up with the utilitarian workwear brand Dinosaur Hampton, helmed by designer Benjamin Kelly. For nine months, seven artists would wear cycora®-made uniforms every day, through seasonal changes, and through some of the most creative demands that can be asked of clothes.
Known for elevating workwear with minimalist, vintage-inspired designs that harmonize functionality and durability, the Minneapolis-based designer created six colorful uniforms made of cycora® regenerated material—and recruited seven materially curious artists, designers, ceramicists, and painters to be our uniform-wearing CUE-Ts. Their mediums: welding, woodworking, painting, ceramics, and clothing design. Their goal: to report back to mission control about the the resilience and durability of cycora® fabric.
The project has now concluded, and the CUE-Ts’ final transmission has arrived. After wearing cycora®-crafted uniforms day in and day out for nine months straight, this is what they reported on the resilience of our molecularly regenerated textile.
Through sun, rain, wind, and snow, this is how the cycora® uniforms held up.
Material excellence means physical strength, versatility, and adaptability. Over the year, the CUE-Ts helped us to create a document of cycora®’s performance qualities in real time. They wore their uniforms while working with metal, sawing wood, painting large-scale murals on buildings, shaping clay, and firing kilns. These are notes from their transmissions.
Echo: Welding has created a lot of wear, many burns and holes, and dirt build-up, but after some modifications, the uniform is still holding strong.
Bravo: The fabric is very durable and soft for every day use—great for dirty work like repairing machines, or painting.
Delta: Layers of wood glue, and sawdust have piled up. No holes, or signs of weak fibers.
Foxtrot: The color has faded, and the stress points have gotten dirty, but the canvas’s durability has kept this farmer protected.
Whisky + Kilo: You can see the artifacts from every sign painted or mural mounted. Often exposed to wind and rain, the uniform offers protection and consistency.
November: Regularly washed, the fabric has held its integrity and color. Stress points like knees and elbows show no sign of wear.
When asked what they were most surprised by, CUE-Ts expressed the dependability of the material’s warmth in cold months and breathability in hot months, its durability and softness for everyday use, its abrasion-resistance and stain-resistance (especially against clay), and its easy washability. more, they found that the uniforms became a kind of second skin—an easy integration into their daily practice.
The secret lives of clothes: What we wear becomes a part of who we are.
The physical learnings of project CUE-T proved the material strength of cycora®. But the 9-month mission taught us something immaterial as well. Our relation to the clothing we choose to live with matters; our clothing takes on memory and character with every experience it shelters us through, with every wear and every wash. As there is value between the relation of our Earth and the materials we take from it, there is value in the memories our clothing carries—and the way that it ages with us.
“My relationship with my uniform is equally intimate and unobtrusive; which is exactly how I think a uniform should be,” CUE-T November told us. “I put it on before going into the studio and don’t give it a second thought, which in my eyes, is a good sign of a well-fit, well-considered piece of clothing.
On his relationship with his uniform, Bravo said “Like an artist’s smock, the uniform has been an awesomely consistent piece of my studio practice. There is great value in having a consistent uniform that I know will always perform for me when I need it. And knowing that the material is a more sustainable fiber makes wearing it all the better.”
From ‘waste’ to uniform, from uniform to future clothing.
