I can’t be the only one that has cleared out their wardrobe during lockdown and realised two things. Firstly, how many clothes they have that they love but never wear, and secondly how many clothes they have that they never wear because they don’t love them. This blog post is about the latter. I had a couple of clothing items that I couldn’t wear because they were in bad condition, didn’t wear because I didn’t like them anymore, or wouldn’t wear them because they were nothing special. Here are three ways that I adapted my clothes.
Bleach Tie Dye (Reverse Tie Dye)
Because I used to work in a cafe where the uniform was all black, I have a lot of plain black t-shirts. Whilst it’s useful to keep some, I rarely wear them, and so I wanted to make them more exciting. I read about people using bleach to tie dye things, so I decided to give it a go. I’ll link the video that I used below, but the basic premise is that you either scrunch, twist or ball up your item, then secure it with rubber bands. Then, you use a squirt bottle to pour the bleach over the item and leave it for a few hours. Once it has sat in the bleach for a while, you rinse out the bleach with cold water, then put it through a quick wash in a washing machine, and finally leave it to dry. I ended up cropping this t-shirt, which left me with a strip of fabric which I decided to use as a headband. This was a great DIY for me, as it is really easy and highly effective – I’ll definitely be wearing this t-shirt more now.
Geometric Embroidery
This one is a little less straightforward. If you have never embroidered something before, maybe consider trying a simple pattern, and have a look at lots of ideas before you decide on one.
I had a pair of white jeans that I never wear because they’re a little bit boring and don’t really go with anything I own. So, the way I created this pattern was by tracing some stars out on pieces of paper and then laying them out on the jeans so I could see what it looks like. This is a pretty crucial step regardless of your pattern, because it shows you roughly what it will look like. Next, I sewed around the stars with white thread to get the shape. Then, I went in with gold embroidery thread – if you don’t have embroidery thread, you can just use cotton, it will just take a bit longer. I basically just filled in the stars with triangles until there were no gaps, then I got rid of the white thread and tidied the threads on the inside. It’s a little fiddly on a pocket, but I find it very therapeutic!
Finer Embroidery
Finally, the most time consuming and fiddly of the three. I had a pair of black jeans that had gone in holes around the thighs, so I cut the legs off and rolled them up, but then they were a little bit dull. So I decided to embroider them. The only real difference between this and the previous DIY is that I added detail in more places, which is why it is more time consuming. Like last time, I drew out the pattern, but this time I drew it onto the shorts with chalk, so that I could follow the pattern as I went. I started with green thread, then went back with different colours. Again, maybe don’t attempt this if you’ve never sewn before, or if you have no patience, but if you can give it a go, it can look really pretty.
So there we go, that’s how I’ve been editing my clothes so that I actually want to wear them again. It’s really important at the moment (in terms of fast fashion) to use what we have as much as we can, and to support small businesses as much as possible. Yes, we need to restart the economy, but that will happen without everyone going out and buying 5 pairs of jeans because they were on sale – it’s not good for the workers or the environment. Instead, let’s get creative!
Sources
Bleach Tie Dye: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1BSwUyJwvKw&t=211s
Waste Makes Waste 