Second hand clothing: Green is in

At the time, I despised every minute of it. I had to argue that no, I couldn’t wear my sister’s school uniform kilt as an everyday skirt.  I’d awkwardly perch a perfectly lovely jacket on my shoulders, ignore my sisters’ rolled eyes, shrug, and announce that shame, it clearly wouldn’t fit.
So I had to ask myself why on earth, twenty years later, was I doing this willingly?  Kilt flashbacks aside, I quickly learned that clothing swaps are actually quite charming, hilarious, and usually accompanied by mimosas.  They’ve become a mainstream social phenomenon (there are even sites like swapstyle.com, a thriving community endorsed by Jessica Simpson – who knew?). Sure, I got excited and took an amazing pair of boots that are so small I’ve had to “train” my feet to fit in them, but at the heart of the idea is a consciousness to consume less, waste less, and look at old things in new ways.
It’s one of the reasons that “Purchase second hand clothing” is the featured action on our Living Planet Community this week. You can save money, water and GHG emissions – and look good doing it.
Take Preloved.  Preloved creates one of a kind clothing from reclaimed vintage fabrics and has a philosophy centred on sustainability: dresses made out of old trench coats, professorial mittens made out of old argyle sweaters.  Its Toronto store is at the heart of scenester-ville on Queen street west, and they consistently draw Fashion Week crowds.
But our love for Preloved is more significant than just the novelty of having a skirt that used to be a baseball jersey.  It’s a collective shift towards recognizing the need to boldly reimagine how we consume.  Preloved was disruptive innovation, throwing the fashion world a huge curveball, and fostering consumer demand for ethical, environmentally conscious clothes.
We’ll be featuring Preloved in our National Sweater Day fashion show this week, so stay tuned.
In the meantime, for those of you who (unlike me) have actually sewn since grade 3, Julia Grieve, the founder of Preloved, has graciously given us some tips of the trade on giving your wool threads a new life:
1.       Make mittens
Trace your hand on hard paper to make a pattern… put the pattern on the sweater, cut it out and sew it together.
2.      Make a scarf
Cut out squares, rearrange them and sew them all back together.  A good length for a scarf is 8 feet long.
3.      Make a throw
Gather up all your old unwanted sweaters (and don’t be afraid to mix in different fabrics like curtains, old tablecloths, etc).  Keep the pattern basic: cut up squares and sew them back together.