Hooplayarn

I love knitting with upcycled Hooplayarn! The selvedges of cotton and jersey are saved from the bin and instead are wound around cardboard cones and sold as yarn to hand knit and crochet into new products. 

I bought my two favourite colours, blue and grey, from the wonderful Fabrications on Broadway Market and transformed the yarn into cushions to sell at the Knit Wits knitting group market stall in Brixton.

Hooplayarn before

Hooplayarn after

Take Back Schemes

Following a visit to Brighton in November 2011, I blogged about the Vans recycling scheme I saw advertised in their shop window and mentioned how great it would be if more shops started operating and promoting take back schemes to increase the available avenues for garments to be re-used and recycled.

It is now nineteen months later and I am very happy to follow up the Vans blog post with examples of more take back schemes I have spotted in shops around London. Furthermore, many schemes include a financial incentive to encourage customers to bring unwanted garments back when they visit the store.

As more people choose to shop in out-of-town malls and shopping centres such as Westfield, traditional behaviours of donating second hand clothing to local charity shops can become increasingly inconvenient.

The Green Style Blog on the British Vogue website recently featured a similar take back for recycle scheme launched by the global  retailer Intimissimi. The following images were taken at Jack Jones, H&M, Marks and Spencer and Clarks.

Jack Jones

H and M

Marks and Spencer

Clarks

Recycle Week 2013

As part of recycle week 2013, DEFRA have developed this infographic about clothing waste with support from WRAP. It's shocking to see the figures, but great to see clothing in the spotlight for recycle week!

Don't let your clothes be disposable - reduce, re-use and recycle!

Patchwork Cushion

As a leaving present for a wonderful colleague, we collected squares of fabric from unwanted materials (which matched colours from Waste Watch branding) and I created a cushion which will now be loved and treasured.

Knit Wits

Pictures from the Knit Wits stall at Brixton Makers Market last Saturday. I am part of this great knitting group, for more info and pictures of the things we make visit the blog!

Upcycled Meeting Room Chairs

I have been working with fellow colleagues at Waste Watch www.wastewatch.org.uk to use unwanted textiles and clothing to reupholster the boring meeting room chairs.We completed them last week. Here they are! Check out wastelesslivemore.com to learn more about the campaign. Tweet your examples @wastewatch #wastelesslivemore

From this....

To this!!

Waste Less Live More Week

Upcycle Fashion is a partner for the Waste Less Live More week campaign, taking place between 17th - 21st September 2012. It will be a week long campaign celebrating and demonstrating that what's good for the environment is good for us.

Upcycle Fashion will be running workshops as part of the campaign - more info to follow soon!

Check out the website for more information about the campaign and how to sign up to be a partner or supporter http://wastelesslivemore.com

Like the facebook page and spread the message on twitter #wastelesslivemore

WRAP clothing report

Read this!

Swish and Pout

Upcycle Fashion attended the Swish and Pout clothes swapping event at Balham Bowls Club yesterday. It was a fabulous event and it was great to speak with many swappers and vintage buyers. Bringing the upcycling, repairs and 'alteration station' to the event provided an opportunity to give advice to swappers with clothing at home in need of some TLC as well as promoting the idea of upcycling and inspire others to have a go!

Moth eaten vintage dress...

...turned into an almost finished jacket!

Everything Must Go

Different items of clothing flocked and turned into non woven materials

Red coat slashed to become 'waste'

Red coat slashing detail

Clothing sorted into piles by colour

Yarn woven from coloured clothing

Blankets made from recycled yarn

Emergency blankets made from recycled yarn

Antwerp - Pop Up Eco Shop

Red bag (front right) - Elvis and Kresse made from fire hose

Textiles Environment Design

The work of recent graduates and alumni from Chelsea College of Art and Design who focused on sustainability throughout their research and design practice can be found on the Textiles Environment Design website below. The varied projects make for interesting reading whilst also showing the diversity of approach from students.

Textiles Environment Design website

Upcycling Chairs!

Old chair

Meeting room

The chairs in this meeting room are in desperate need of an update. We completed our first upcycled chair today and it looks awesome! One down - 7 to go! We are re-upholstering the chairs with pre-loved fabrics selected from our 4 themes, branded with 4 different colourways. 

Deconstructing, sanding and painting the frame.

Re-upholstering the seat and back panels with pre-loved materials.

Tools of the trade.

An upcycled 'Green Economy' colour themed chair.

 For more information about Waste Watch and the four themes please visit the website.

Recycle Your Vans

Whilst in Brighton last week I noticed this incentive to take back your old Vans in order to get money off a new pair. Although I'm not sure exactly how these shoes are 'recycled', I like the incentive Vans give to their customers to take back and 'recycle' their old shoes (although simultaneously providing an incentive to buy a new pair!).

After some further investigation it turns out that Vans have also experimented with more 'sustainable' materials such as recycled PET and hemp.

I would like to see all shops offering services to take back, repair, reuse or recycle the products they sell in the first place.

Youth Group Workshop

 This week I visited the White City community centre to run an Upcycle Fashion workshop with a youth group. With an introduction about upcycling followed by a sewing workshop, time was rather tight as we only had an hour. However, the group began quickly and really impressed me with their neat and straight stitching! The workshop was part of a series called White City/Green Planet at the community centre. This series is organised by Our Common Place, an initiative run by Waste Watch to encourage communities to work together to improve social and environmental wellbeing. For more information please visit the  Waste Watch website

An Upcycled Halloween Costume

Materials sourced from my local charity shop: 1x pair of red trousers, 1 x red skirt, sleeves from 1 x red jumper

Upcycled Jewellery

           Making jewellery with a year 3 class at a primary school

The props used in high street shop window displays are changed frequently and often discarded after use. The beads, bangles, ribbons, pom poms, lace and other such decorations I used in this jewellery workshop had been saved from Monsoon/Accessorize by my friend who works there. The company invest in many props frequently to decorate their visually enticing window displays. After the season ends however, these decorations become 'waste' and are thrown away unless staff or the public save them from landfill. Fortunately my friend could not let these wonderful gems and beads to go waste and took around 5 huge bags of decorations home. I was lucky enough to be able to take a couple of bags from her to use for a jewellery making workshop at  a primary school. The children loved the beads, bangles and gems and when I told them the story of the materials, and that they had been saved from landfill it raised many questions regarding other waste from shops, other things that are unnecessarily thrown away. This is such a waste of materials that have plenty of life left in them and so much potential to support creative projects!