Eco Trash Couture
To View Project Details
Albuquerque Journal
N.M. “Obamanos Coat” bound for Smithsonian
By 
Kathaleen Roberts / Journal Staff Writer
June 3, 2011
Read article on-line.
SANTA FE – The day after the presidential election, Nancy Judd went Dumpster diving and turned out a coat.
Now the coat – pieced together from 2008 Obama materials, specifically paper door hangers that canvassers left on door knobs – has morphed from trash to treasure as part of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.
Using one of the president’s New Mexico campaign slogans, she calls it the Obamanos Coat.
The Santa Fe environmental artist and educator joined the Barack Obama for president campaign for six months before the election, organizing volunteers and canvassing her neighborhood. On Nov. 5, she scoured the trash bins at campaign headquarters across Santa Fe and Albuquerque, going home with yard signs, posters, decals and paper door hanger photo cards.
She picked up a vintage 1950s men’s coat at a consignment shop, then started cutting 1- by 3-inch strips from paper door hangers emblazoned with photos of the candidate and his volunteers.
“I attempted to size it to fit the president,” she said. “I went online and tried to find his dimensions. I found somebody who claimed to be his tailor. I literally had about 30 volunteers in my studio. The coat itself took about 400 hours to make.”
Santa Fe environmental artist and educator Nancy Judd created her “Obamanos Coat” out of recycled 2008 Obama campaign print material. The coat will soon become part of the permanent collection at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. (COURTESY PHOTO)
The garment formed part of a trio of “Change Couture” that included a cocktail dress pieced from plastic yard signs and a “Voter Swingcoat” in honor of New Mexico’s political status as a battleground state.
“It’s made of voter registration photos cut into quarter-inch strips woven into material,” Judd said.
The series traveled to the Green Inaugural Ball, as well as a reception honoring the New Mexico congressional delegation and the New Mexico Inaugural Ball. The publicity landed her a front-page story in The Wall Street Journal and international coverage from Mexico City to Paris and Kuwait.
Crafting garments from garbage is nothing new to Judd. The one-time coordinator of the Santa Fe recycling program, she initiated her own company called Recycle Runway and helped launch the city’s annual Trash Fashion contest and Recycle Art Market. Today, she gives workshops on recycling and other environmental issues throughout Santa Fe’s schools and youth organizations.
Her Recycle Runway traveling exhibit (now in Atlanta) has been showcased at airports around the country. It debuted at the Albuquerque Sunport in 2007. She’s made a flounced flamenco dress from fanned pieces of junk mail, a cowboy skirt and vest woven from phone book pages and a flapper dress sparkling with teardrop-shaped “sequins” sliced from aluminum cans.
Judd submitted the “Change Couture” series after her sister heard the Smithsonian was collecting campaign memorabilia. She learned the Obamanos Coat had been accepted when she got a call from a Smithsonian curator.
“I think it was just shock,” she said of her reaction. “For an artist to have a piece in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian is really a dream come true.”
She threw a little “bon voyage” party with the “sealing of the shipping crate” this week at Astilli Fine Art Services in Santa Fe.
She said more alchemy is to come.
“I’d love to do a project for the first lady,” Judd said. “A compost dress.”
The biodegradable garment would be made from fruit and vegetable peels from the White House garden attached to cheesecloth.
“I’d use the cheesecloth to make layers and layers of lace,” she said, adding, “Our immediate environment is our body.”
UpFront is a daily front-page news and opinion column. Comment directly to Kathaleen Roberts at kroberts@abqjournal.com or 505-992-6266 in Santa Fe. Go to www.abqjournal.com/letters/new to submit a letter to the editor.
— This article appeared on page A1 of the Albuquerque Journal
Read article on-line.
Designer and environmental educator Nancy Judd creates wearable art out of recycled materials
Obamanos Coat
Part of the Smithsonian Institution’s permanent collection!
Door hangers from the 2008 Obama campaign were cut into 2 inch strips and machine sewn to panels made from canvas scraps. The panels were hand stitched on the vintage man’s winter coat. This voter gear took 25 volunteers over 400 hours to complete. It was created in 2009.
Change Couture Collection at the Green Inaugural Ball
The Obamanos Coat is part of the Change Couture Collection which was showcased at numerous inaugural balls in Washington D.C. in 2009 for the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama.
The Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture has added the Obamanos Coat to its permanent collection and is considering its inclusion in one of the initial exhibitions when the museum opens on the National Mall in 2015.
Change Couture Collection
This collection of garments fashioned out of discarded campaign materials, is made up of three garments: the Obamanos Coat, the Obama Cocktail Dress and the Voter Swing Coat. The Collection is a celebration of the millions of people who worked countless hours to assure the election of Barack Obama as the President of the United States.
Nancy Judd of Recycle Runway was a devoted volunteer in the Obama/Biden Campaign in Santa Fe. She organized hundreds of people in her neighborhood and inspired friends and relatives across the country to volunteer. This collection is a documentation of her experience being part of this exciting campaign.
The day after the election Ms. Judd went “dumpster diving” behind Obama Campaign headquarters in northern New Mexico. She filled her car with historic campaign materials that she transformed into elegant garments with the help of over 25 dedicated volunteers in two months!
Ms. Judd brought the Collection to the 2009 presidential inauguration in Washington D.C., showcasing it at the The Green Inaugural Ball, the reception to honor the New Mexico Congressional Delegation, and the New Mexico Inaugural Ball.
The Obamanos Coat has been accepted into the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture!
Nancy Judd Wall Street Journal Article
International Media Coverage for the Change Couture Collection
Wall Street Journal, January 13, 2009
Metro Paris, November 2009
Metro Santiago, November 2009
Metro Mexico City, November 2009
Metro New York, November 2009
Albuquerque Journal Video, Jan 9, 2009
Planet Green, January 20, 2009
Tree Hugger, January 19, 2009
トップ > ライフ・カルチャー > ライフ, January 19, 2009
Agence France-Presse (AFP), January 19, 2009
YahooNews.com, January 19, 2009
Kuwait Times, January 19, 2009
Las Vegas Sun, January 18, 2009
Media Fax Photo, January 18, 2009
Forbes.Com, January 18, 2009
Fox New.com, January 18, 2009
Santa Fe New Mexican, January 4, 2009
KSFR Radio, December 30, 2008
New Mexico Business Weekly, December 23, 2008
Channel 4, KTOA, December 23, 2008
Agence France-Presse
Dumpster couture makes foray into Obamaworld
Nancy Judd at the Green Inaugural Ball
January 18, 2009
By Olivia Hampton
WASHINGTON (AFP) — It was the day after Barack Obama’s historic November 4 election win, when environmental artist and educator Nancy Judd went dumpster diving behind the Obama campaign headquarters in Albuquerque, New Mexico, desperate to collect any salvageable materials.
“I made a mad dash around town. In many cases, they had already started throwing things in dumpsters and I was pulling material out of dumpsters,” Judd told AFP.
“I started seeing posters and decals and I was finding drawings by children and all kinds of amazing materials that I felt like I just wanted to save … then it was just an obvious next step: since I make clothing out of trash, I am going to make a collection of garments and take it to the inauguration.”
Judd unveiled her “Campaign for Change Couture Collection” Saturday at the Green Inaugural Ball that drew about 1,000 environmentalists, an event among dozens in Washington honoring Obama’s inauguration.
The centerpiece was “Obamanos,” a 1950s vintage men’s coat adorned with countless 1.5-inch (4-centimeter)-long strips of Obama campaign door hangers that Judd said took 200 hours to make.
“I interpret it as we are Obama, we are this movement. It’s a tribute to the millions of people who worked for him,” she said.
Even Obama’s defeated opponent, John McCain, has his place on the coat — under the right armpit. Although the suit was tailored to fit Obama, wearing it would not be an easy affair.
“There’s a little bit of movement back and forth, but he can’t wave,” Judd explained.
At the ball, Judd wore an “Obama cocktail dress,” fashioned from campaign yard signs sewn in overlapping layers on a recycled sheet.
A model showed off the “Voter Swing Coat,” made from voter registration posters for New Mexico, a swing state, cut into strips and woven together into a paper fabric adhered to recycled canvas. A paper lace from punctured voter registration cards covered the coat’s collar and outer edges.
Crafting a single one of her handmade garments usually takes about six months to make, Judd said. But with the help of some 20 people in her studio, she wrapped up all three pieces in just two months.
She is also selling tote bags made from discarded yard signs to help finance her trip to Washington, where she will present her Obama-themed collection again on Monday at a reception for a New Mexico delegation and will organize workshops for local students.
Judd, 40, is no stranger to “trashion.” She first started making clothing out of discarded materials a decade ago and made her hobby into a business, Recycle Runway, two years ago.
Among her dumpster chic are a faux fur coat with thousands of loops of cassette and video tapes and an evening gown adorned with some 12,000 pieces of crushed glass — both of which took 400 hours to make.
“When you can engage people in a really positive way that is fun and playful and makes them smile and is creative, I feel like the message can be stronger than the doom and gloom, we’re all going to die kind of thing,” Judd said.
Judd’s hopes are also echoed in the energy and environmental policies of the incoming administration. Obama has called for an effort to overhaul US energy policy on the scale of the Apollo project that first landed a man on the Moon.
His plan includes unleashing 150 billion dollars over 10 years to create five million new “green” jobs, an 80 percent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and ensuring that 10 percent of US energy consumed comes from renewable sources by 2012 and 25 percent by 2025.
“This time must be different,” Obama said in December when referring to his environmental and energy policies.
“This will be a leading priority of my presidency and a defining test of our time. We cannot accept complacency, nor accept any more broken promises.”
