Mancunian vintage store, Junk Shop, is encouraging people to think more about how our purchases can affect the world that we live in, in aid of World Recycle Week.
The environment has been taking punches from the fashion industry for years due to the lack of consideration that comes with wasting clothes.
It was reported in 2012 that an estimated £100million worth of used clothing goes to landfill in the UK every year.
Junk Shop designer Charlotte Keyworth told MM that by constantly throwing away our clothes, we will eventually poison ourselves.
“Clothes that recycle, they’re going to be there forever,” she said.
“If people keep buying these cheap clothes we’re all going to poison ourselves, people need to wake up to that.
“If you think of the journey that it’s already gone on and all of the energy it’s taken to make, and then people just throw it in the bin, it’s so sad really.”
Junk Shop do everything they can to make their products environmentally friendly, by using Greater Manchester recycle mills and buying old fabrics.
They hold sewing classes to show how much effort and work goes into making clothes to educate people on the true cost of clothing.
Ms Keyworth said: “We are using our natural resources that are in Manchester such as people’s unwanted fabrics and clothes. We are up-cycling them and reusing them and making them into something beautiful.
“People should realise that cheap, fast fashion is not just a cost of the environment, it’s the human slaves that are making these things that you’ve got to think about as well.
“Whatever money we’re making we’re buying from the recycle mills and then they’re giving it to the charity shops and we’re all working together. The corporations are just out for their shareholders and their profits.
“Soon, every city will look exactly the same, we’ll just end up with the same shops selling the same rubbish.
“If you want to be an individual and you want to support young designers, then the money stays within your community.”
The average UK household owns around £4,000 worth of clothing with 30% not being worn recently.
Manchester Metropolitan University is also taking a stand with their termly clothes swapping events, called Pop Swap.
Ryan Waugh, Sustainability Engagement Co-ordinator, told MM: “We try to encourage and educate people at the events about sustainable fashion and what options they have instead of only buying new clothes.”
World recycle week runs from April 18-24, and MM encourages you to recycle all of the unloved clothes that you may have stuck at the bottom of your wardrobe.
Image courtesy of Neesa Rajbhandari, via Wikipedia, with thanks
