Savvy shopping with DoNation

It’s was H&M’s recycle week last week (18-24 April) when H&M stores offer 30% off instead of their usual 15% in exchange for your old clothes. As Stoke-on-Trent is still waiting for our incoming H&M store, I have some other ways you can be environmentally savvy with your shopping…

Basically I’m going to be talking about sustainable fashion and why you lovely people should keep in mind before your next spending splurge (student finance guys, you’ll be tempted). Sustainable fashion essentially meaning clothing, jewelry, shoes etc made by workers that were treated fairly and the land used sustainably (Fair enough, right?).

Cotton production uses 20,000 litres of water to make only a T-shirt and jeans (according to the World wildlife fund website). So much water is used in fact that it has actually begun to shrink the Aral Sea, killing off rare species and having serious damaging effects for the local community. Our demand for new shirts, dresses and skirts is quite literally drinking it dry, whilst poisoning the rest with chemical and pesticides.

Ways to follow the pledge…

Buying second hand or vintage clothing. Most recently my prize purchase was a gorgeous faux fur coat for £25 from Affleck’s vintage store, Manchester. Almost the same coat new from Topshop was touching almost £120! I saved myself a load of money, avoided the wasteful packaging of ordering online and got to feel super smug about my bargain hunting/ upcycling capabilities.

Some of the shops nearer to Stoke-on-Trent I’d recommend are:

• Past and presents on Bridge Street in Newcastle (Under Lyme- just to clarify)
• Charms and Chains on Town Road in Hanley
• Pentage on Brunswick street (Pentage having more of a hippyish style).

Visit a charity shop, they are everywhere! and most people give away perfectly good clothes just as an excuse to buy more during the holidays, and of course you know your money is heading to a good place.

Also a great destination for second hand treasures is Lou Lou’s vintage fair, which shall be coming to King’s Hall in Stoke on the 8 May, alongside the weekly antiques fair in Newcastle Town centre every Tuesday.

I always used to throw my clothes away when the colour started to fade, I’d be walking around in fifty shades of grey…. Gross. High street jeans are really bad for this and super overpriced. So now I buy a packet of fabric dye and re-dye them! With dyes id normally say use either vegetable or Henna, which works on your hair too without the risk of impending baldness!

Why bother?

• Buying second hand means your money will go to a far more deserving place (charities and independent sales people) rather than the huge corporations.
• Reduction in pollution caused by manufacturing new clothes.
• You are saving water which communities and entire eco systems depend upon.
• Clothes won’t be wasted.
• You’re saving money.
• You’re looking lovely…

If you want to look lovely, pledge your ‘passion for fashion’ at: www.DG4B.com/sustainstaffs