Practicing the Work of a Sustainable Digital Fashion Designer/Maker 4.0: Design of an Organic and Modular Clothing System Based on the Industry 4.0 Approach

Industry 4.0 in the Fashion Industries is having its momentum through the application of digital fabrication technologies encompassing 3D modeling or computing-aided design (CAD), additive manufacturing (i.e. 3D printing), and subtractive manufacturing (i.e. laser cutting, cutting through plotter, and CNC machining) technologies in changing the fashion system in all aspects, from the business models to the creative fashion designer professional skills and activities. In the wave of Industry 4.0 (I4.0), a new design paradigm has been emerging based on the cooperation between digital production and manual expertise: new digital artisans/ fashion designers 4.0 emerged as being able to work on scouting old crafting techniques and updating them through the use of digital fabrication technologies to boost their creative abilities, explore aesthetical possibilities, and start-up new economical businesses. This paper aims to present the status of the art of the digital fashion designer/artisans practices through a preliminary literature review as a baseline to present a case study of hybrid digital fashion craftsmanship focusing on the design and implementation of an organic modular garment system based on the I4.0 approach. The case study will serve to describe the impacts, opportunities, and limitations that digitalization and additive manufacturing techniques could have on fashion design in terms of creativity, design and manufacturing processes, new skills and practices, and sustainability.