FABRICS REMNANTS AS A SOURCE TO CREATE
SUSTAINABLE MURAL HANDICRAFTS INSPIRED BY ISLAMIC ARTS

Basma Mohamed Aboelyazeed Mahmoud
Dr., Lecturer of Handicrafts, Art education Department, faculty of specific education, Alexandria University, Egypt. basmaaboelyazed@yahoo.com

Abstract
The field of handicrafts depends on experimentation , so the researcher choose Fabrics because it is considered one of the available materials, which can be divided to natural fabrics, industrial fabrics and mixing between the two of them , it has a lot of patterns and colors,  also it has porosity , suppleness and tenderness , fabrics use was limited on its original nature without any change or treatment , so the researcher tried to change this nature and turn it to become one  of  the sustainable materials, which can be used in handicrafts to create sustainable mural handicraft inspired by Islamic arts, The research problem is summarized in the following questions:   

• Can the fabrics remnants be used as a source to create sustainable mural handicrafts?
• Can some technical treatments be applied to give the remnants of fabrics hardness and sustainability ?

So the researcher assumed that:

• some technical treatments can be applied to give the remnants of fabrics hardness and sustainability.
• the remnants of technical treated fabrics can be used to create sustainable mural handicrafts inspired by  Islamic arts .

the research aim is about having benefit from the fabrics which is treated technically by the  polymers, such as (polyvinyl acetate) and ( transparent wood varnish) , to give remnants of fabrics hardness and sustainability in the handicraft ,The research Importance appears in being one of the researches that contributes to sustainable development in handicrafts field, and it includes a lot of special technical ways to use fabrics remnants, this research cares about inspiring some of geometric and floral  Islamic decorative  units, it is expected to have an economic payoff from this research if it has been applied in the field of small projects , this study includes six main themes:
1. defining the fabrics kinds, 2. defining the polymers and its types which has been used in this research , 3. The concept of sustainability, 4. the meaning of mural handicraft , 5.the Islamic decorative units types ,6.the experimental application which has been applied by the students of the third year at the art education department – faculty of specific education –Alexandria university , they applied a lot of technical ways such as (rolling, quilling, crimping ) on the remnants of fabrics to implement it on the Islamic decorative units, then each one of the students made two pieces of handicrafts  one of them is 40×40cm and the other is 20×20cm.

at the end of the experiment the researcher made a work shop to collect the students? handicrafts together to form the mural handicraft, which consists of 64 handicrafts size of 40×40 cm and 72 handicrafts size of 20×20cm,which have been divided in two opposite walls  ,it was great joy for the students to see their handicrafts on the department walls one next to the other , also it was impressive mural handicraft  , because it has a variety of techniques , colors, geometric and floral Islamic decorative units, and two deferent sizes of the handicrafts , all this give the mural handicraft variety , unity ,harmony and integration ,then the results and recommendations are presented followed by references.

Keywords: fabrics remnants- sustainability - mural handicrafts - the Islamic decorative units.