If you aren’t already familiar with Mark Liu’s work, you will be soon. The 27-year-old fashion dynamo is resonating in the European fashion scene for his ethical fashion philosophies. He’s best known for his Zero Waste technique of cutting fabric such that none is wasted, and he’s eager to spread the word to other up-and-coming designers in the eco-world.

A graduate of the prestigious Saint Martin’s College with a master’s degree in textiles futures, Mark has pioneered a method of cutting fabric that reduces textile waste by 15 percent. He uses every scrap of the fabric in some way, from lining to embellishment.

We caught up with Mark a few weeks ago just as he returned from giving a talk at the Beyond Green symposium in Amsterdam. Read on for his thoughts on what he calls “the next generation of sustainability.”

Can you explain your Zero Waste concept to us?

You always start with that rectangle, but then you cut it in jigsaw patterns that fit together perfectly. It’s much more efficient. By the time you have made seven dresses, you have one “free” garment.

No sewing means tying knots and using tension. The more I practice, the better I get at it. A little trial and error. Well, a lot of error.

I’m keen to scale up to see if this will work. There’s something about putting money behind it that creates pressure, and mass production is where you actually see a savings.

You get to wear the process on your body. In an unpredictable world, the safest thing to do is the impossible. No one sees it coming.

Your next collection for Fall/Winter 2010, to be presented in February, is tentatively titled “The Breakdown of Logic.” What can you tell us about it?

It will have fewer cut edges, more sealed edges, and more tailoring with 3D sculptural elements and texture. I was inspired by Gödel’s completeness theorem. I use math to express myself — looking at feedback systems, envisioning how the final product changes the cutting process.

I imagine the collection going very high end with the hand-cutting, but I also want it to be very accessible. I work on commission only right now and make very limited editions. But I want to have everything sell out and have nothing left. Otherwise I’d rather not make it. It goes against the Zero Waste philosophy.

Do you work with animal products?

I was really affected by the Cradle to Cradle book on sustainability, and now I’m preparing for the next generation of sustainability. Leather is terrible for the environment. It’s a combination of animal parts and chromium, which is a serious pollutant. Nontoxic tanning processes don’t really exist, so I’m very skeptical of “vegetable tanning” of leather. That’s true for a lot of green things. Soy inks leach chemicals, FSC-certified paper is inferior quality, some plastics are not meant to be recycled. A bottle was never designed to be eco-fleece, for example.

Fur is quite different, though. We can’t recreate fur as beautifully as nature has. It’s not good to wipe a species out, but there are societies that have been using it forever. So I don’t jump to conclusions.

Who are your favorite designers?

Issaye Miyake, Yoshi Yamamoto, and Rei Kawakubo from Comme de Garçons. They know fabric, they know technique, and they keep pushing the boundary.

Who would you most like to dress?

Summer Rayne Oakes. She is savvy about fashion and she has a good eye. Any smart woman, really. You don’t have to be a movie star. You just have to care.