This project explores the expression of military wear in contrast to tie dying inspired by the anti Vietnam War movement, there is a strong contrast between these two expressions and the purpose of this paper is to combine them in order to find new expressions within menswear.

Initially, to gain a greater understanding about military garments an interview was conducted with the systems representative of the Swedish Armed Forces who explained the reasoning behind design decisions in the Swedish army uniforms. This information was used as a foundation for the project and further led into an exploration regarding the functions of pockets in these garments. Military uniforms have pockets with specific functions and reasons for placement, scale and construction and these aspects of pockets were explored in combination with tie dying to find new functions and expressions.

By constructing seven outfits, a fashion collection was developed by using several different design methods, including a great amount of prototyping, sketching and trial and error. The result is a collection that combines the strict, masculine and highly functional military wear with the organic and spontaneous expression of tie dying.

In conclusion, tie dying is an ancient dying technique that has most likely been used since before recorded history, however it is highly connected to the new age movement and anti war protestors of the 1960s. This is why it serves as a contrast to a military uniform; people who were protesting against the Vietnam War were often wearing tie dyed garments. In essence, these two expressions are connected even though they are symbols of opposing sides and combining them could be an interesting approach to creating new functional garment designs.