and that we want to reduce the amount of #TextileWaste that ends up in #landfill.
…And if an item can’t be repaired, over 3 in 5 of our #SecondHand clothing purchases have displaced the need to buy new ones!
The rise of resale websites like #Vinted and #Depop have been an eye opener into just how much #clothing we all own. You can now search for a specific item by size, colour and brand so easily that buying second hand is becoming easier than ever.
Someone donated some amaaaazing wax prints to the Lair and I could not go past this 5m length so I spent my last $30 on it (cheap tho!!!) because I thought it'd be perfect for my Frocktails dress.
I spent a week hemming (pun lol) and hawing over what pattern to use but ultimately decided on Birgitta Helmersson's zero waste tier dress because it goes with the whole textile waste hill I am gonna die on. Though technically I'll have fabric left, I think the dress will only have used up 3m and what's left is a whole intact piece.
Yes, I have cut into the large flower motif butttt I think it'll look more interesting. I'm doing view D which is a maxi length with a second tier.
We opened our new Sewing Lair store in Moorooka for a preview yesterday and it was a success!!! I'm so excited to connect with local creative people, I LOVE to talk about sewing and craft so much and even though peopling is exhausting, discussing shared special interests is soul restoring!
I did little activities during our event, magic leather bracelets and hand sewn crafty medals. It was fun but my verbal communication is garbled at best, no wonder I didn't become a teacher.
The official opening is Wednesday and I was so worried we'd need to scramble to do a big restock - the problem isn't that we don't have enough stock, it's that we don't have enough volunteers to sort and measure everything. (So if you're local to Beenleigh and love sewing or crafting we'd love to see you!) Fortunately, the shop still looks well stocked despite selling SO MUCH yesterday. It's truly a testament to how full our deceptively petite store is.
I haven't yet set up my sewing space as we needed it to put up a measuring table. Soon we will have a fold down table and I can start moving in. I am concerned about where to store my fabric as I have several big tubs and not a whole lot of room to put them. Same with my ironing board. I am thinking about making an ironing pad I can place on top of a gate leg table I'm hoping to get for cutting out. But I'll wait and see how the space works before I purchase that (second hand of course).
I almost can't believe where my life is right now. Four years ago I was hospitalised with chronic mental illness stuff and undergoing TMS treatment. I didn't think I had much of a future at all. Now I am opening a store and managing it with an awesome team of women, sewing plus size clothes, and spreading the word about textile waste and creativity!
Today I was one of many who helped save two trucks of "we don't know how many" coming from a warehouse full of textiles that was going to be dumped. It was mostly lingerie fabric and trims, all perfectly good and usable. This is why I volunteer at the Lair! So much good shit is sent to landfill and we see .000000001% of it! If that!
I'm not mad at the people clearing the warehouse - it's a sad backstory and it must happen all the time. This is why community is vital, we need to link up and distribute resources that would otherwise be sent to the tip. With these resources we can share low cost and free items that help people make stuff they don't have to buy. We can take down capitalism... Well... A little bit of it.
Somewhere between 10% and 40% of garments produced every year are destroyed unsold.
I realised I would be volunteering on Halloween so I had to make myself a spooky/ crafty ribcage t-shirt. The only new things in this shirt are the thread and ric rac.
Broken Zipper? #France Will Pay to Get It Fixed. Cheap, disposable clothing is causing an #environmental #disaster. Now, the home of #hautecouture is chipping in for its citizens’ #garment #repairs #textilewaste #environment #recycling #clothingrepair #repair don't throw away - there is no away.
I picked up some cute pastel doilies today so I made them into a hat. Unfortunately I broke a size 90 needle while top stitching over a particularly gnarly doily and that tells me it's bed time.
Oh and I also grabbed a bunch of scraps from the free fabric bin and made a reclaimed denim hat. I love all the inclusions from the former garments.
I forgot to show off the new "brand" for my reclaimed Tshirt project!
A slop shop was a store that sold cheap* ready made garments in the 1800s. These days, "slop" appropriately describes the tonnes of fast fashion that rot in landfill. The industrial revolution really changed our consumption of all things and for the clothing industry it created a capitalist's dream. Billionaire brand owners take advantage of garment workers, who are largely poor, people of colour in the global south.
So being conscious of this, and loving to use a thought provoking phrase or two in my lifetime, I am calling my new project Slop Shop. I'll be using fabric diverted from landfill to create clothing hand made by me. I will prioritise larger sizes for plus size people.
I don't have all the fancy industrial machinery but my garments will be well made and should last for years with proper care.
* Cheap clothing has always equalled cheap human labour. This means people are poorly paid in awful working environments.
Two tshirts for $11!!! Well, and a few hours labour. Even the pattern, the Closet Core Patterns Core tshirt is free.
Somehow I have more pants than tops, so I picked up some bits of cotton jersey yesterday at my vollie gig and mixed them all up to make these tees.
I need more tshirts so I found some odd bits of cotton jersey at my volunteer gig and I'm making Closet Core tees tonight by mixing them all up.
The pink and yellow stripe will have matching sleeves but the green stripe will have purple sleeves.
