For Dave Stephens, a suit is more than something to wear to the office - it can be a work of art.

The lecturer at Varndean College in Brighton has used a second-hand suit as the centrepiece of his latest work.

The outfit is filmed experiencing a variety of situations, including being worn by Mr Stephens' eight-year-old son William and about 15 other people.

It has also been taken on a bus, a tour of Brighton Museum and Pavilion Gardens and filled with sand.

Its latest incarnation shows it tied to two other suits and a wooden structure.

Each stage of the project has been caught on film by Varndean media instructor Matt Brownsword.

The project started with the suit being worn by Mr Stephens, a sculptor, after he bought it in a shop in North Road, Brighton.

Its journey has since been made into a seven-minute film called The Suit, shown recently as a continuous loop at the Baltic Gallery in Gateshead.

Mr Stephens, 50, of Round Hill, Brighton, said: "It's a film about a suit and what can happen to it.

The suit was turned into a constantly changing sculpture, it is a memory of the sculpture as it is being created.

"It is a sculpture which takes on its own life. It grows and shrinks. At the moment it is tied up with two suits, making its own friends. I suppose it will stay like that until I run out of rope."

The father-of-one said the work was a continuation of his interest in changing sculptures.

He described one of his previous works as a "rotting fossil", which included clothes eaten by insects.

He said: "Whereas Damien Hirst's insects die, my sculptures make them strong. I had many strong slugs in my sculpture.

"That was where the idea for The Suit came from - something constantly changing, a record of how something can change and develop and take on its own life force."

One of the stages of the film showed the suit being turned into a "giant egg timer".

Mr Stephens sewed up the arms and legs of the suit and the jacket to the trousers before filling it with sand.

It stood up by itself for a while before toppling over on to its creator.

He said: "It was like a dead weight lying on the floor.

"I've always loved the idea an object which can be seen as one thing at one stage in its life and can be viewed as something completely different when put into a different situation.

"I chose a suit because it is a way of defining a human being without having a human being inside it. As soon as you fill a suit with sand, people think it is a fat person. It becomes a symbol of a human being.

"I'm also interested in fragility. People wear a suit to preserve their modesty but it is a very fragile piece of clothing."

He hopes to exhibit the garment and film in Brighton.