Did You Know, Your Most Exciting Clothes Are Actually Already In Your Wardrobe?

Something old really can become something new – from up-cycling to crafting to donating to repairing, there are so many ways to be forward-thinking with fashion…

Make your first resolution a promise to stop throwing things away. TK Maxx has been running a Give Up Your Clothes For Good campaign with Cancer Research UK for 15 years. Get involved by donating as many bags of clothes, accessories and homewares as you want in store at TK Maxx. So far, the campaign has raised £32.5 million towards vital research into improving survival rates and reducing long-term side effects for children and young people with cancer. The charity TRAID stops all kinds of belongings getting binned by working in 191 boroughs across the UK, with a network of more than 1,500 donation banks, home collections and charity shops. Find the closest to you at traid.org.uk

Make Do and Mend
It’s so much easier to make minor repairs than you might imagine – and can really help renew your commitment to your clothes. ‘Mending encourages us to value our clothes differently,’ says TRAID’s engagement officer, Chanelle Joseph. ‘Working on a garment gives us an understanding, perhaps for the first time, of the resources that go into producing fashion. Repairing challenges fast fashion’s short-term fix by enabling us to become users of clothes and not only consumers.’

Jobs like replacing buttons, removing stains and darning patches or holes can all be done by hand and take a few minutes, says Stephanie Campbell, who works on WRAP’s Love Your Clothes campaign. She suggests investing in a starter kit of scissors, coloured threads, sewing needles, straight pins, a tape measure, a thimble and a seam ripper – and hitting Love Your Clothes’ website for sewing tutorials. Follow Insta sewers, @sewoveritlondon, @sewrendipity and @newcrafthouse to buy fabrics, book classes and generally get stitch-happy.



By Natalie Hammond.
Full story at Grazia Daily.