Uncertainty is an essential element of creativity, which in turn comes from mindful attention to your craft of choice. My craft is resewing existing clothing.

Harvard psychologist Ellen Langer says our current culture leads us to try to reduce and minimise uncertainty, leading to mindless rigid behaviour governed by rules and routines.

On the other hand, if we exploit the power of uncertainty we learn that things can become more than we previously thought possible. Mindfulness makes us sensitive to context, perspective, and changing situations.

Sew it Again is a response to changing circumstances around the way we dress. As clothing becomes cheaper, plentiful and designed with built-in obsolescence – an extraordinary amount of clothing waste has been accumulating around the world. 

Having observed this waste in op shops and wardrobes, I’m taking action this year to demonstrate how we can be mindfully creative and use simple sewing skills to revitalise old stuff for a second life.  It is great to have the opportunity to display and demonstrate my upcycling at Coolah’s Pandora Gallery.

Nothing worth doing is achieved alone and the genesis of this project involved a trip to Coolah last year to visit my leadership buddy, organic beef producer Ele Cook. We made the history skirt – which is now Sew 125 – from several ‘fill-a-bag for $5’ bundles from her local op shop. which we washed, chopped and sewed one evening.

At the time, I knew the waistband we put on would not last the distance, but we made do. For today’s upcycle, I’ve fixed that waistband using the base of a t-shirt, and teamed it with a vest Ele found elsewhere. I removed the old waistband, found an opshop T-shirt in complementary colours, cut the bottom off it and sewed it directly onto the history skirt, with the cut end being turned over with existing elastic re-inserted.