Connie also won First Prize and seed funding in the Santander Ογ½ΆΦ±²₯ Ideas Competition 2021 for a design to create a sustainable and durable, hooded cotton towelling changing robe for swimmers, which avoids the microplastic pollution of synthetic alternatives. She was supported in developing her idea by the Ογ½ΆΦ±²₯'s beepurple initiative offering students and graduates practical support to start their own businesses.
A 2020 graduate in BA(Hons) 3D Design and Craft, Imogen has fabricated a new material made from leather scraps – responding to the discovery that a staggering 800,000 tonnes of leather scraps end up in landfill annually. Unlike leather itself, Imogen's composite material can also be cast in a mould – a fact that helped her win the New Designer of the Year Award 2020 (Environmental Design) in association with Creative Conscience and the Business Design Centre.
Imogen said: ““Sustainability and avoiding waste have been the most important parts of my projects. In my second year at Ογ½ΆΦ±²₯, I created a material made from fibrous plants and I proposed it could replace the need for leather all together.”