Category Archives: repair and care

Sew 198 – Refashion to suit yourself

The benefits of upcycling are you can wear clothes that suit your body shape, are comfortable, in colours/fabrics of choice … and reduce your environmental footprint as you dress with conscience.

Apart from underwear, it is many years since I bought a ‘new’ garment. I’m upcycling and refashioning every day this year as a way of auditing the many wardrobes of pre-loved clothing I’ve rescued from opshops, family and friends. I do this because there is pleasure, reward and satisfaction in rescuing natural-fibre garments that are under-valued and worthy of refashion – and to demonstrate an alternative to fast-fashion churn and buying new.

Sew 198 was an assortment of op-shop garments that I’ve massaged to suit myself. The long navy knitted wool-blend skirt had two white stripes at the bottom. Continue reading →

Sew 191 – Beach beanie + jumper skirt

Lots of laughter with this wool jumper upcycle as the beanie attracted comparisons to attire worthy of a Dr Seuss character. It was created from the sleeve of a hand-knitted wool jumper, which I unpicked from the body of the jumper and simply tied a knot at the end.

The body of the jumper was then turned upside down to become the skirt after the sleeve opening was hand-stitched together. I harvested strips of fabric from a dated blue silk dress – one strip was used to form a narrow waistband, others were used to trim the bottom of the skirt, while the long bottom frill of the dress was knotted to become an elongated scarf. There were several holes in the body of jumper (probably the reason it ended up in the opshop for me to salvage) which I darned with grey wool and they are barely visible in the complex patterned knit. See photos below. Continue reading →

Sew 190 – Eco-dye with tea leaves

It’s taken a while, but I’m now dying with tea. Cream wool is pretty but the colour doesn’t seem warming enough for winter. This men’s wool knit is a favourite op shop find from a few years ago and I enjoy its soft cosiness. Its upcycle as Sew 190 happened by chance – when I splashed it with tea while lounging on the sofa. Although I immediately sponged it, the tea stain remained.

The solution was to gather all the ‘best before 2012’ tea leaves and make a big brew. The wool absorbed the colour beautifully and evenly. I left it soaking in the brew for about 30 minutes, spun out the excess then dried it in front of the fire. The jumper is now a beautiful caramel shade and smells of Earl Grey. Continue reading →

Sew 189 – Jumper to jazzy skirt

Tradition and convention tend to keep us locked into established patterns – be that of behaviour, processes and possessions. A jumper is a jumper – until you turn it on its head.

Transforming old reject jumpers/sweaters into skirts is one of my favorite and easiest upcycles – and it’s the focus of an upcoming workshop on July 25 at the Jumpers and Jazz Festival in Warwick. If you’d like to join us, at the Abbey of the Roses activity, you can book here.

I love wearing long wool skirts with tights for winter warmth so I’ll be making more in coming days to demonstrate creative ways to reuse old wool jumpers with holes in them. Continue reading →

Sew 184 – Darn holes in wool

For those preferring an eco-lifestyle, winter means delving into the wool stocks to keep oneself warm rather than heating the entire house – especially in a climate like Brisbane’s where the winter sunshine works its magic by late morning.

That’s how I found one of my favourite scarves had developed a hole – which I darned using an op-shop-gathered ball of wool of similar tone. I like the idea of wool being visibly mended – it’s a badge of honour that says upcycled, sustainable, care of natural resources.

After mending, I used this scarf as a wrap skirt teamed with an opshop found wool skivvy from which I removed the high neck and turned it into a head band. Continue reading →

Sew 182 – Merino lives on

I’m half-way through the Sew it Again project – and celebrated by flying into the Gold Coast this morning with the sun rising on a beautiful clear sky day – and a bush walk up Mt Coot-tha with daughter Lily where the clear skies meant we could see across Moreton Bay.

I loved visiting the colourful, cultural melting pot that is Kuala Lumpur to catch up with my brother Tony Capon and his family, and my aunt Kate McLachlan from New Zealand, but city high-rise living in a tropical metropolis is very different to our leafy-green Queenslander lifestyle in inner-suburban Brisbane where we live close to nature. Continue reading →

Sew 171 – Tropical shirt becomes apron

This apron is refashioned from a children’s shirt, with second-button torn on an otherwise useful cotton garment.

The tropical print is getting me into a packing mood for a trip to Malaysia tomorrow – sorting summer gear and scarves. And I’m pleased to still have at least five guest upcycles by Gwen, Bev, Audrey, Kerrie and Meredith from the productive Biloela workshop to post while I’m in KL!

Today’s tropical shirt was part of a ‘fill-a-bag for $2’ batch of natural fibre rejects I recently gathered from my favourite Windsor Road Baptist Church Thrift Shop and Eternity Boutique. I am trying to keep out of op shops, but like my upcycling colleague and fellow frugal-refashionista Karen Ellis of #scavengerstyle in Victoria I’m always on the lookout to rescue useful stuff that’s going to waste. Continue reading →

Sew 170 – REfashion is non-toxic

The reasons why I’m upcycling natural fibre garments during 2014 include because it is creative, mindful, resourceful, flexible, sustainable, thrifty, bespoke, handy, fun, ethical, reducing waste, shifting habits, demonstrating alternatives and non-toxic.

This Ecouterre article about toxic threads provides further affirmation: “Around 80 billion garments are produced worldwide, the equivalent of just over 11 garments a year for every person on the planet, according to Greenpeace. The growing volumes of clothing being made, sold, and disposed of magnifies the human and environmental costs of our clothes at every stage of their life cycle, which means that even minute quantities of toxins can cumulatively amount to the widespread dispersal of damaging chemicals across the globe, the group says.” Continue reading →

Sew 165 – Mending favourites, again

It is exciting to be in central Queensland for a creative upcycling workshop supported by Biloela Arts Council and the Banana Shire’s Regional Arts Development Fund. This marks the beginning of a community-wide REfashion Revolution in which we open our minds to chopping and changing dated garments into something more current and wearable.

Some people toss out unworn clothes, hopefully to an op shop rather than into the rubbish. Many others treasure the natural fibres or the sentiment of garments and hold them in the back of the wardrobe – even though they aren’t wearing them because they no longer fit, are frumpy or old-fashioned in style or stained in some way. Continue reading →

Sew 156 – On World Environment Day

On average Australians throw away around 21 million tonnes of waste per year, according to the Australian Government’s Living Greener initiative. This figure includes waste from our homes and gardens as well as waste generated from building and renovating our homes.

Since the population of Australia is 22 million, we’re each contributing nearly one tonne (that’s 1000 kg) of waste every single year. This is three kgs of waste each, every day, every year ongoing.

Steps to reduce waste are simple actions we each undertake to minimise our footprint on the planet – today as World Environment Day and every other day after that. Continue reading →