In January 2019 in World 59, a city council declared a climate emergency and a coalition of citizens, institutions and businesses understood the impacts of textile waste on people and the environment, especially in poor countries.
A big research to understand the local waste and recycling dynamics resulted in a big positive campaign and people feel more connected with their clothes. We all become users rather than hectic buyers and feel empowered to mend, proudly showcasing the aesthetics of the used. Laundries promoted a milkman-like delivery service to care for the clothes, and a very well used swap system emerged.
What if …
everyone understood what happens with the textiles they no longer use?
Issue targeted:
recycling being a social license for people to waste more and textile waste’s effects on the global south
Inspiration:
The exorbitant amount of clothes donated for our local refugees and asylum seekers for a monthly drop in we run with Sewing Cafe Lancaster and Global Link and the research on local textile recycling and waste dynamics I’m working on.
This World was contributed by Victoria Frausin (located in Lancaster, UK) using a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International licence which allows others to share and adapt the work in any medium and for any purpose, providing that they credit the author and share their material using the same Creative Commons licence.
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