Research Postdoctoral Fellowship - The British Fashion Council, UK

Job Opportuntiy

Research Postdoctoral Fellowship

Closing date: 15.03.2021

NB: Full Details/Application via: https://www.britishfashioncouncil.co.uk/Jobs/Research-Postdoctoral-Fellowship

Organisation: The British Fashion Council
Post: Research Postdoctoral Fellowship
Project: The Institute of Positive Fashion’s Circular Fashion Ecosystem Project
Reporting to: Shailja Dubé, British Fashion Council
Principal Investigator:  Dr Alex Hetherington, 3Keel

 

Since September 2019 the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)  has been working as part of an internal sustainable fashion working group across UK Research and Innovation. This working group promotes systematic change within the fashion industry to embed ethical and sustainable practices and recognises that investment from UKRI, encouraging collaboration across industry and academia, can play a key part in facilitating this change.

The Circular Fashion Ecosystem Project provides a perfect opportunity to formally establish a partnership between the AHRC and the British Fashion Council (BFC) which will create a network across a key global industry and the UKRI/AHRC research base.

The partnership will deliver a humanities-led collaborative approach to synthesising and building upon existing sustainable fashion-focused activity across the disciplinary and sectoral landscape. The partnership will provide thought leadership in this area, generating new insights through an innovative and interdisciplinary programme of activity, and will seek to influence the development of policy and practice.

This research project will explore human relationships with clothes and the longevity of garments. Cutting across consumers, academia and industry, the research will examine garment consumption and care, with the ultimate ambition of reducing the number of garments going to landfill. An integral part of this project is a fantastic opportunity for arts and humanities scholars to undertake a short-term research project in collaboration with a prestigious industry partner. The IPF will award a fellowship, up to 12 months in duration, to one or more post-doctoral researchers providing highly transferable skills and workplace experience essential to their future career development. 


The Post

The BFC are seeking to recruit two UK-based post-doctoral researchers to work individually and collaboratively to engage with stakeholders, scope skills and expertise, produce briefing papers, working papers and think-pieces, initiate interdisciplinary and collaborative research projects, engage with wider disciplinary and sectoral stakeholders (including the public, as appropriate), and produce a final, shareable report.

Full details of the activities within these themes, including how the researcher’s activities best compliment the lead Research Agency’s work will be decided by the BFC Programme team in consultation with the researcher. 

The selected candidate will be an employee of the British Fashion Council for a 12 month fixed term contract on a minimum of 3 days per week. Salary is £40k pro rata.

This is a unique opportunity to join a multi-stakeholder and multi-year body of work to implement systems-level change, moving the UK fashion economy to be circular and on the path to sectoral decarbonisation.

This is a high-profile, results-oriented project with global reach and significant influence. The BFC will work with industry, academia, and the UK Government to deliver on the programme objectives. As the inaugural project from the Institute of Positive Fashion, the BFC and our industry partners are dedicated to ensure this is a robust and credible paper that will form the foundation of subsequent phases of the project. 

Personal Specification

The role will be field-based and applications are welcomed from UK-based Post-Doctoral Researchers across the breadth of arts and humanities disciplines as supported by the AHRC. Applicants should be able to:

  • Demonstrate an equivalent of two years post-doctoral experience, which can include relevant transferable professional experience

  • Take up the Fellowship week commencing 12th April 2021

  • Travel to London if deemed necessary, depending upon Covid 19 regulations

Brief

The Fellows will work closely with Dr Alex Hetherington and 3Keel Consortium, the BFC’s selected Research Partner to fulfil the research activities as set out in the Circular Fashion Ecosystem program.

The project from the IPF and will be delivered in 3 phases:

  • Phase 1: Research

  • Phase 2: Proposal for Change

  • Phase 3: Best Practice Implementation

This results of Research Phase 1 will be the foundation of subsequent CFE phases, outlining a roadmap for change in anticipated timeframes, identify the actions to be taken to drive businesses individually and collectively to move to new innovative models which are circular in nature.  Legislation and regulation will play a critical part in this, as well as a need to consider how to bring new skills to the workforce. The project’s ambition is to act as a blueprint for other nations to look at their efforts in creating a circular fashion industry globally. Ultimately, this is a story about the role the UK fashion Industry can play to help build a world-leading approach in the UK, by outlining practical solutions for businesses to embed circularity into their business operations.

3Keel and the Consortium have significant sustainability expertise in the circular economy, across the textiles industry in particular, possess an understanding of global markets and government policies on waste and recycling.  The research also comprises researching consumer insights and behaviour towards fashion and responsible consumption.

The successful candidate will work individually to engage with stakeholders (including the public, as appropriate), scope skills and expertise, produce briefing papers, working papers and think-pieces, initiate interdisciplinary and collaborative research projects, engage with wider disciplinary and sectoral stakeholders, and produce a final, shareable report driven by a to-be state of a circular fashion ecosystem in the UK.

Full details of the activities within these themes will be developed by the 3Keel and consortium team.

Background

The CFE project will focus on how the UK Fashion industry can responsibly manage textile waste, address excess inventory, and move to circular business operations. The CFE will be action-oriented with proposals for change and it will look at the practical approach that we need to take in the UK to address key areas of the industry including:

  • Education and Training

  • Sourcing, Design and Innovation

  • Inventory Planning

  • Manufacturing

  • Collections and Recycling infrastructure

  • The Consumer Mindset

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