Glasgow Kelvin College Fashion Student’s innovative product wins a coveted award!
HND1 Fashion & Manufacture with Retail student at Glasgow Kelvin College, Laurence Estanove, has been hailed as a September Winner in this year’s SIE Fresh Ideas competition!
Toulouse-born Laurence, who’s now living and working in Glasgow, entered her innovative new creative product - The Brolibag - to the SIE Fresh Ideas competition to gain support and recognition to develop her blossoming business.
With an eye to sustainability and recycling, Laurence’s brolibag idea repurposes broken old brollies – which are commonplace in Scotland – and uses the fabric to create eye-catching and stylish tote bags.
Inspiration for the product came to Laurence when she was moving house from France to Scotland and realised she had a collection of colourful, broken umbrellas she hadn’t thrown out. As her principal interest is in sustainable fashion she was loathe to put them in the bin. As she says,
“I didn’t like the idea of throwing them out so I cut up the fabric to possibly use and recycle as a future sewing project and brought them to Scotland.
After some thought, I decided tote bags were easier to sell and more accessible than clothes.
My bags are that bit more original and funky than other tote bags as they’re also reversible – they come fully lined with cotton so you’re getting two bags in one.
I’m delighted to win the £100 prize which will go towards developing and marketing my product, and I’m excited that my entry will go forward to the SIE annual competition.”
The Scottish Institute for Enterprise (SIE) creates opportunities for students to be innovative. SIE works nationally to promote and support enterprise and entrepreneurship in Scotland’s students. Fresh Ideas is Scotland’s longest running national student enterprise competition for ideas at an early stage. The competition is designed exclusively for students and recent graduates of all subjects.
At Stage 1 of the competition, two winning innovative ideas are selected each month, both receiving a cash prize. Stage 2 is where each winning entry goes forward to be judged with the winner carrying off a cheque for £1,200 and a personalised package of in-kind support for their business idea.
Laurence is always on the lookout for broken brollies, the gaudier the better! Especially here in Glasgow where they seem to litter the streets and she’s asking people not to throw away their brollies. As everyone has probably had a clear-out over lockdown, this might be the ideal time to find those brollies a home and be repurposed.
She’s now thinking about how she could accessorize her product so there could be a campaign afoot to ‘Bring Back The Rainmate’!
The Brolibag, and Laurence’s success, was featured recently in the West End Today site
and her range can be found on her social media sites:
Here at Glasgow Kelvin College we are incredibly proud and impressed by Laurence’s innovative thinking and skilled craftsmanship in creating this product and wish her continued success.
Congratulations and well done to her and to the staff who are supporting her during her learning journey.
