Congratulations to MAFS Alumni ’16, Joelle Firzli

We are thrilled to announce that MAFS Alumni, Joelle Firzli, has been awarded the 2023 TSA Research Travel Grant. This award supports individual TSA members in textiles research-related travel—local, regional, and international of any type, specifically for the in-person study of textiles.

To learn more about Joelle’s project, please click here.

Joelle Firzli is multicultural fashion researcher. Her main area of interest is the intersection between fashion and cultural sustainability, exploring how the business and theory of fashion can help maintain and promote cultural identity, preservation and legacy, as well as social and climate justice. Joelle is also a fashion entrepreneur and the co-founder of Tribute Collective, a responsible multidisciplinary organization focused on elevating visibility for global ethical fashion and design, and on community building through programming such as exhibits, workshops, and discussions about the global fashion industry.

“This proposal seeks support to offset the cost of traveling to Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, to research, study, and learn about the history and the techniques behind the making of mouchetée fabric. The TSA’s Research Travel Grant will provide me the opportunity to spend time in the studio and workshop of Pathé’O, one the most celebrated and prolific Ivorian designers whose work has been widely acknowledged for its contribution to the collective visual culture of African and global fashion. This support will further enable me to complete one of the chapters on Ivorian textiles and heritage, part of a bigger project on researching the history of textiles and fashion in Cote d’Ivoire. I hope it will serve as a handbook by which designers, students and scholars can better comprehend how Ivorians shape their sartorial and aesthetic identities and re-valorize their cultures through fashion.”