Solution: Upcycled fashion garments. Owner: EXISTING. Circular Strategy: Reuse.
Description
EXISTING is an upcycling brand that reimagines non-virgin materials to produce unique garments which have hidden and transformable features.
Location
Nottingham.
Scale
Local.
Potential circular economy impact
EXISTING provides a creative, interactive solution for unwanted, damaged, or undesirable clothing. They aim to give stylish individuals a unique alternative to the mainstream fashion systems, which continue to add to the endless ethical and environmental injustices occurring across the globe.
Their solution is interactive, which gives customers a creative opportunity to engage in reusing their objects. Upcycling adds to the conversation surrounding overconsumption, while also placing value on objects which were perhaps forgotten about, or not wanted anymore. Upcycling can increase the customer’s emotional connection to their garment(s) when the customer is given the chance to redesign their clothing. By increasing the user’s emotional connection to their clothing, they are attempting to elongate the life of the original garments, because they are being used more, as opposed to being sent to a charity shop, and/or landfill.
What’s involved?
People: Staff to fix clothing and run the process of collecting and returning clothes to their owners.
Resources: Sewing machines; mannequins; material to upcycle.
Technology: Social media platforms.
Implementation: Social media to promote services; workshop.