Posh Swaps Blog

Today we have some great examples of second hand style and how you can make great outfits with thrifted or secondhand clothes. The photographs were sent to us by Cynthia, who has a website and Etsy shop selling beautiful re-purposed clothing, purses, hats and lovely accessories.

This piece is adorable, it has a lot of vintage stuff on it. The fringe is actually off of an old drama curtain. It hangs beautifully around this lace and satin ruffle. She added a few bobbles with the vintage earring broach it is removable for dry cleaning. Every thing in this piece is up-cycled for new use.

vintage slip remade, skirt goodwill, boots thrifted‏

This is a really darling coat. It just glitters with thoughts of the holiday season. Small multi-color sequins have been sewn on the coat for the festive feel. Great for over your special party dress. Looks super with jeans as well.

Today we have some great examples of second hand style and how you can make great outfits with thrifted or secondhand clothes. The photographs were sent by Cynthia, who has a website and Etsy shop selling beautiful re-purposed clothing, purses, hats and lovely accessories.

Frugal living is currently a necessity for many people but has also become quite fashionable as people find new and creative ways to live on a minimal budget. The media have likened this frugality to the second world war when rationing and shortages forced people to ’make do and mend’. John Lewis has even rewritten a wartime make do and mend booklet for modern times. It gives some great tips that still apply today as well as some new ones such as the economic use of the central heating.

This make do and mend philosophy, is not just frugal but also environmentally friendly and a real contrast to throw away society that has become so prevalent in recent years. Make do and mend positively encourages a reduction in waste and recycling in all sorts of different ways. Some thing that may be quite alien to many but that fits in perfectly with the current economic climate and make do and mend philosophy is making do with the clothes we have instead of buying new. Of course it help greatly if the clothes were great quality and classic styles in the first place.

A whole movement of fashionistas has began to spring up around the make do and mend idea. Clothes swapping, swishing parties, clothing repair and alteration, buying and selling second hand clothes and refashioning/ reworking old clothes have all become popular ways not just of saving money and the environment but also of creating unique, interesting and beautiful outfits.

I recently posted about a DIY refashioning project where I used bleach to create patterns on T shirts and turn a boring plain t shirt into something a bit different. I have now tried out the same technique on a pair of old jeans. This a great way of breathing new life into a pair of faded black jeans. The bleach not only creates a great pattern on the jeans but also changes them from faded black to a nice grey colour. You can vary the colour of the jeans, the pattern and the contrast of the pattern depending on how long you leave the bleach for. For my refashioning project, I scrunched the jeans up and rolled in some neat bleach in the bottom of a washing up bowl, left for 2 or three minutes and then filled the bowl up with water before leaving for a further 10 minutes and rinsing well.

For a less striking pattern leave the neat bleach on for less time and for a lighter overall effect leave the jeans to soak in the diluted bleach for longer. There is a bit of trial and error involved. The first time, I didn’t get enough pattern had to try again.

Don’t forget to protect your clothes when using bleach and wear rubber gloves!

We are pleased to present our first Posh Swaps DIY refashion project. We thought that we would start off with something fairly simple. We have refashioned two boring old t shirts/ tops by bleaching them. It can take a little bit of trial and error to get the desired effect, but it is really quite simple. We used some tops/ t shirts that we bought from a second hand shop for a few pounds.

All we did was to bundle the t shirts up and tie them loosely with string. We then covered our clothes with an apron to protect and donned some very attractive rubber gloves. We put a bit of bleach in the bottom of a washing up bowl and rolled the tops in the bleach. We left for about 3 or 3 minutes before topping the bowl up with water and leaving for another 10 minutes. We then cut the string and rinsed the tops really well.

For the eco friendly option, you can use an eco friendly bleach like Ecover.

This black top turned orange when bleached. I love the effect even if it does look a little like the hippy tie dye thing. It is worth experimenting with the amount of bleach coverage for different effects. A bit more bleach and this top would have been even more orange.

This orange t shirt changed yellow when bleached, making it a really colourful summer t shirt.

All Posh Swaps Refashion projects are available to buy on www.posh-swaps.com

Top designer & stylist, Mrs Jones has created a limited edition collection of only 30 reinvented Oxfam pieces that are on sale now in the Camden High Street Oxfam Store and Oxfam online. Each piece is made from second hand clothes so is completely unique and there is certainly nothing last year about these clothes.

Tie Dye Brittania - the all English sundress in trendy denim

Hats off to  monochrome - an incredible bustier dress in black and white

Shipmate Stripes and Shirts - sailors stripes and shirty checks.

Cheeky nautical stowaway - this striped mini declares ‘genius’ across the derriere

Eighties biker revival - embellished black leather bomber with black and white patch print leggings

Even if you don’t buy any of these, there are some great ideas for DIY projects that you could work on yourself. Don’t forget you can also buy and sell refashioned, reworked and restyled second hand clothes on Posh Swaps.

It’s great to see so many of the nominees for the Innovation awards using recycled materials this year. The competition was lauched by the Ethical Fashion Forum this year to support new fashion designers whose work exhibits both outstanding design and sustainability. The winners will have the opportunity to show at Estheica at London Fashion Week in September and will get support from an expert consultancy team.

The sustainable fashion using recycled materials, include:

• MIA - combining second hand clothes purchased from local markets in Malawi with traditional Malawian textiles to create contemporary womenswear.
• Dandi Maestre - handmade jewellery and accessories made from natural and recycled materials including reclaimed wood.
• Henrietta Ludgate - based in a crofting village in the highlands of Scotland and using surplus fabrics from mills including fleece and tweed.
• Hetty Rose - Handmade shoes using mainly reclaimed, recycled and vintage materials with very little waste including Japanese Kimono fabrics and recycled leather.
• Lu Flux - clothing made using upcyled vintage material.

picture - Lux Flux

Just incase you were in any doubt as to how trendy eco fashion is, it had now been confirmed by the launch of a collection made from recycled clothes at Topshop. Topshop is considered the most cutting edge and innovative of the high street fashion store and it’s introduction of a line of recycled clothing proves that being green is red hot. It follows in the footsteps of Oxfam’s recycled DIY collection which has recieved plenty of publicity lately.

The collection is by the Eco brand My Only One, that used second hand and women’s vintage clothing to create beautiful and fresh new designs. The ideas come from a team of innovative and emerging designers.

The collection will launch at the Oxford  Street store of Topshop and will be called Sport Noveau. It will feature stylishly reconstructed sportswear.

The lastest book on our must read list is this book for DIYers, restylers and refashioners. Junky Styling founded by Annika Sanders and Kerry Seager is one of our favourite ethical and eco labels. AFter recieving many compliments on their own restyled clothing, the girls set up the company, sourcing clothes from charity shops and jumble sales and deconstructing them to create something new. The original Junky Styling clothes were made from tailored suits and menswear reconstructed into twisted garments. Junky Styling now works from a workshop in Brick Lane with a talented team of designers producing all sort of collections. They also offer a service to redesign your old wardrobe by overhauling, customising or altering your garments.

The new book by the founders of Junky Styling features simple projects that show you how to reconstruct you wardrobe including step by step instructions on how to turn trousers into a fitted top.

We can’t wait to get started!

We are so excited there are yet more exciting activities in the refashioning, DIY, customising and restyling of vintage and second hand clothes. It is such a great way to recycle old clothes into something really new, unique and exciting. A pass time that is becoming really popular lately.

Oxfam has lauched a DIY competition with a prize of a custom garment designed by Mrs Jones and their winning garment will be featured on the online pages. Mrs Jones is the designer that Oxfam has recently brought on board to design the Oxfam DIY collection, a limited edition of 30 pieces, created using second hand clothes. Previously, Fee Doran AKA Mrs Jones has worked with some of biggest names in the industry and celebrities including Kylie and Goldfrapp.

You can enter the competition by submitting photographs of your creation to Flickr or by emailing them. Full details of the competition are on the Oxfam website. There is also a gallery of entries, great for inspiration.

Don’t forget, you can also sell your recycled, refashioned and restyled creations on www.posh-swaps.com.

Another great idea is to buy clothes cheap online, for wholesale clothing prices. After you wear them a bit, then refurbish them, to save even more money!

Picture from www.oxfam.org.uk

Everyone is refashioning at the moment, obviously the word is getting out that you can get some really amazing clothes using second hand and vintage items. Oxfam has just opened a DIY store in its Camden shop with unique creations made from second hand. Top designer and styling Mrs Jones has revamped the store into retro heaven which has become an oasis of style for trendsetters and vintage enthusiasts.

Mrs Jones who is a stylist to the celebrities including The Killers, Kylie, Scissor Sisters and Goldfrapp has created a limited edition collection of only 30 reinvented Oxfam pieces that will be on sale in the shop and online soon. The shop opened on Saturday with a series of DIY workshops run by the stylist herself.

If you can’t get along to the store, you can always have a go at refashioning some second hand clothes yourself with their DIY tutorial on how to turn jeans into a skirt. You can also get some ideas from their sidewalk to catwalk gallery.