My tribute to Fashion Revolution and my silent protest against fast fashion, I’m a walking #haulternative to shopping on the high street. Upcycled vintage skirt, given to me by a friend; home-made top and jacket and my shoes are one of my best investment buys, featured in Fridays post. Even my jewelry .. the one with the purple beads was 2hand and the other two I’ve owned for over 10 years and I wear them every day.
I had so many friends on FB say they loved this skirt as it was, I decided to stay true to the original design. I was also intrigued by the branding on the inside of the hem so I did a little research. Sportaville were a London company well known for vibrant novelty prints, this one dates from the late 1950s. Their garments were made from high quality cotton, as this one is, often from a French manufacturer, Boussac. One of their mainstay products was the “kit-skirt”, customers bought the fabric cut to shape and made up themselves. I just love the fact that this skirt has a story and a history to it, that I’ve been able to bring it back to life; makes it all the more delicious to wear!
As lovely as it was, it was tiny so I needed to alter the waist to fit me. I took out a couple of the pleats at the front and put a new waistband on it. I went for a vintage-look washed out denim that I had in my fabric drawer which toned with the confetti dots but didn’t detract from the print design. I was able to keep the pleats at the back and found a button in my sewing box in the perfect colour.
As it’s a full, pleated style, it calls for a short top showing the waist. The flowered top above is a vintage M&S one which fits me well and was the boxy shape I wanted. I took a pattern from it and used the same denim as the waistband. I’m a bit partial to raw edge denim, it happens to be on trend and I thought it would give the skirt a modern twist! I was determined to use the top hat waistband somewhere!
The jacket was a piece I made in my 2nd year at college. The top was attached to the jacket, at the back shoulders and waist … to put it on you had to lift over the head .. not very practical. I took the top out, it wasn’t quite right with skirt so I’ve saved that for another upcycle.
I wore my tribute outfit to go to an exhibition of The Upcycle Project organised by Fashion Revolution attended by the wonderful #fashrev team, pictured below with founders Orsola de Castro and Carry Somers. The project was a 2 day upcycling workshop for fashion students, lead by experienced practitioners from the industry, including Dr Noki. They used textile waste and experimented with new techniques and materials. The garments were then exhibited and auctioned to raise money for Fashion Revolution. I’m going to have a go at the Dr Noki t-shirt slashing technique in a future upcycle.
