Cotton sculpture

My pupils in school are at the early stage of creating a soft sculpture made entirely of cotton. Their idea is to show the journey of cotton from the sowing and picking, right up to a garment being bought and worn. We have the help of an artist who is co-ordinating this project on using natural resources in art.
The children saw an exhibition of work by Boston artist, Ellen Driscoll, called Fast Forward Fossil, where one of her pieces is a sculpture made entirely of plastic milk bottles. The amazing piece was in the shape of the Niger delta, and on it were lots of scenes of destruction of the world, flooding, oil rigs, petrol stations... The whole piece depicted the over exploitation of oil and its affects on the world.
My pupils used to idea of crops and agriculture in our locality as a natural resource, looking further afield at our dependence on the developing world for important food commodities too. Cotton as a crop and commodity is the final stage of our art project.