When we slow down and use traditional home-sewing skills to repair and refashion clothing that already exists in the world, we are practising slow fashion. This is the opposite end of the spectrum from fast fashion which thrives on high turnover, continuous and conspicuous consumption of newly made fashion clothing.

Slow magazine recently posted a story about the Sew it Again project, while another thoughtful magazine Womankind has a great article about the merits of meaningful creative practice. Womankind says that the story of making something may have disasters and triumphs along the way, but it brings meaning to our lives. 

It is so easy to go out and buy stuff – much more interesting and creative to make it yourself. Photographed below left, is part of one of Womankind’s 132 pages. Our son Casey is marrying Jenna next year and there is a lot of ‘making’ going on as part of their preparations. One current project is the cross-stitched table numbers (being hand-stitched by Jenna’s mum Denise) in frames (being hand-painted by Jenna).

Meanwhile, when Casey and Jenna visited home recently I showed Jenna an opshop-found cotton knit jumper (part of the $2 fill-a-bag find) which I’d washed and repaired by pulling the loose threads through to the inside using a crochet hook. The size, fabric, colour, neckline, and hemline-bow feature worked for Jenna – but not the flared sleeves. That was easy to fix, I just reshaped the bottom portion of the sleeves by sewing, cutting off the excess, then securing the cut edge by stitching several times (to prevent unravelling of this coarse-woven knit). Note: Sew up from the bottom edge so you ensure an even finish where it shows. Jenna wears the refashion with her own skirt and shoes. Thanks Jenna!