CPUT lecturers have contributed their own time and skills to assist disadvantaged individuals empower themselves with a saleable skill.
The Technology Station Clothing and Textiles (TSCT) along with the City of Cape Town Enterprise Development Unit have been visiting impoverished communities around the Peninsula, informing them about support they could provide.
On one of these visits the TSCT met up with a group of SMME’s (small, medium and micro enterprises) in Mfuleni that required support, says TSCT manager, Shamil Isaacs.
The TSCT developed a six-hour pull-on skirt programme, which enables the SMMEs to gain enough basic skills to develop and sew a basic pull-on skirt which they can make to sell.
The main objective is to transfer knowledge through university resources to empower disadvantaged communities.
This will allow them to create opportunities for themselves and indirectly stimulate a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship.
The programme was conducted over two half days.
Deidre Windvogel, the lab technician responsible for product development at the TSCT, provided instructions on how to make a pull-on skirt pattern and using simple techniques create individual designs and make fit adjustments. This was conducted at Lookout Hill in Khayelitsha.
Norma Wagenaar, the lab technician responsible for garment technology in the Clothing and Textile Technology Department, took the participants through the paces of sewing the skirt and ensuring that a high, saleable quality standard was achieved.
A total of 32 participants from Mfuleni received training and a more advanced programme is being planned for the future.
The TSCT is based at the Bellville Campus and provides support to SMMEs in the Clothing and Textile sector
