Fashion labels, like From Somewhere, are upcycling discarded textile materials to turn waste into beautiful, unique garments. 

Upcycling is defined as the act of turning waste materials into a desirable and usable quality objects. This method of manufacturing is right in line with the cradle-to-cradle philosophy, and engages the consumer in an understanding of how their responsible purchase has kept the landfill from growing a little bigger. In the world of fashion, garment designers are realizing the wealth of opportunities in the realm of upcycling and are doing a fine job of proving that style definitely doesn’t have to be sacrificed for the sake of sustainability.

Fashion has become a commodity in modern times, as fast fashion makes the latest runway trends available to almost anyone with a wallet within days of collection show on the catwalks. But with so much fashion constantly produced and consumed, huge waste piles of perfectly usable textiles are forming in landfills, alongside all the other negative effects of an exploitative and far too rapid fashion process. As a response to this destructive behavior, the designers and labels featured below are turning trash into treasures by utilizing waste from car interiors, discarded fabric rolls, used clothing, upholstery materials, and even swimsuits. Their philosophies for waste-reducing fashion processes are inspirational, and offer their supporters the benefits of local production and a fantastically colorful and unique wardrobe.

Piece x Piece

Defining itself as a “thoughtful disruption to the traditional path one usually takes in the apparel industry from fabric mill to land fill”, Piece x Piece creates one-of-a-kind garments from luxury fabric swatches. Their mission is to create beauty from waste, hopefully inspiring reconsideration of our relationship to waste. With a collection of beautiful and elegant, but slightly quirky patchwork style garments, Piece x Piece aims to provide seasonless, timeless clothes that allow us to “progress toward new philosophy about what waste really means and how we address it.”

Goodone

Fashion-forward, sexy, block colors and body hugging silhouettes all define the collection of London based fashion label Goodone. The independent and eco-conscious label is “reinventing the potential of what upcycled garments can be” by utilizing reclaimed fabrics in almost all parts of the design process. The end result is a highly coveted collection of defined, feminine garments that are suitable for almost any occasion. With the mission of achieving positive change from within by visually blending with the mainstream fashion industry, Goodone ultimately aims “to give women the opportunity to feel good about their clothes and work with what already exists to achieve more.”

Platinum Dirt

Platinum Dirt is designer Dustin Page’s creative response to discarded leather materials generated by the automobile industry. He sources material from cars such as Mercedes-Benz, Cadillac, Lincoln, BMW and Volvo to re-fashion it into quality leather gear. Platinum Dirt’s handcrafted VIN jackets incorporate the vehicle identification number (VIN) plate from the resource providing car, as well as hood ornaments and zipper pulls made from car logo emblems. The likes of luxurious silk brocade are used for lining and pockets, adding a polished touch to each of these, sleek and structured, one-of-a-kind jackets.

Looptworks

Based in Portland, OR, Looptworks is a consciously minded business that repurposes pre-consumer waste to create limited edition accessories and garments. “From concept to your closet, we can assure you that no new materials were used to create our clothing and that each item is as individual as the person who wears it,” says co-founder Gary Peck. Because the label depends on excess material from other manufacturers for the production of their items, Looptworks only makes up to 500 of any given style, hand-numbering each one to signify its uniqueness. Looptworks is putting forth a new manufacturing method for the fashion industry by cutting down on emissions, production costs, design time and resource use when compared to traditional fashion production. As Peck asserts, “we hope people start to think about what they buy, where it came from, and what natural resources it required to produce it.”

From Somewhere

From Somewhere is one of the first fashion labels that turned upcycling into a real trend, and has been addressing the balance between consumption and disposal since 1997. Run by Orsola de Castro and Filippo Ricci, the label reuses luxury, designer textile waste to make gorgeous clothes that have been featured in upper-scale departments stores, the red carpet and several books on sustainable fashion. The label has even collaborated with Speedo, turning discarded swimsuits into amazing evening gowns and dresses, like the Unity Dress designed to sponsor Speedo’s athletes at the 2012 London Olympics. From Somewhere collections are a vibrant mix of colorful production off-cuts, damaged fabrics and end-of rolls that have been turned into exquisite, high quality garments. Make sure to stay posted for the new collection due out in April!

Images: From Somewhere, Gregoire Vandebussche, Goodone, Platinum Dirt, Looptworks

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But the questions is: Would you wear it?

The process of turning waste into something wearable has long been a visionary goal of eco fashion. Under the guise of upcycled fashion are haphazard DIY missteps that have cost the movement dearly in perception and respect. And yet, within this arena we do find innovation and creativity.

Take a look at some of the designs from Central St Martin’s Sustainable Catwalk jewelery show, ‘Tomorrow’s Chip Papers,” held on April Fool’s Day. Challenged to create beautiful, earth-friendly adornments from garbage bags, twigs and discarded kebab sticks, the BA Jewelery Design students created striking originals for the catwalk. There seems to be no shortage of imaginative fantasies, but the question remains: Would you wear it?

As we celebrate Earth Week, let’s reflect on some West Coast fashion ideas that looked crazy at first but have transcended the realm of unwearable imaginative fantasy to represent what upcycled fashion could and should be – edgy, zero waste, forward-thinking and quite simply, crazy cool.

Taking fashion concepts to new heights, San Francisco-based design and manufacturing shop Turk+Taylor’s latest collection is cut from a retired hot air balloon. Salvaged from Colorado and shipped to a friend’s warehouse in San Francisco, designer duo Mark Lee Morris and Andrew Soernsen unfurled “what seemed like miles of rip stock nylon,” to find they had over 400 yards of uniquely color-blocked fabric to create distinctive windbreakers and dresses that soar in a season of colorful outerwear and bold patterns.

In what he terms “a moment of clarity,” Dustin Page, the designer behind Oakland label, Platinum Dirt, looked at the worn yet durable leather seats of his Volvo, and saw the perfect material to make his handmade and highly desired VIN jackets made of reclaimed vintage leather auto upholstery from old Cadillacs, Lincolns, BMW, Mercedes, Jaguar, and more. I’ve never seen one of these fail to get people excited whenever they’re on view at fashion events. And thus explaining why the pair – partner Aaron Parrish provides the business brains – quickly got the call from the Hollywood cool-guy set, including Jamie Foxx, Jeremy Piven and Adrian Grenier, requesting their own one-of-a-kinds. The lust-worthy women’s version is sleek and tailored, beautifully toughening up any floaty feminine look.

The fashion world’s hard sell goes hand in hand with the mass media. It’s hard for any of us to resist consumerism when it is so alluringly presented in the glossies, making Nike’s latest Nike Sportswear offering the Premium Print Pack sneaker for women, so deliciously ironic. The sneakers are made from actual recycled magazines that have been shredded and reconstituted. Launched this year, the shoes are a subscription slave’s best revenge.

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Certain articles of clothing have immediate revolutionary connotations – Che Guevara’s beret, Mao Tse-tung’s jacket. The t-shirt is fast becoming the rebel standard of the eco-pioneer.

Initially thought of as an undergarment, the t-shirt that was memorialized as the symbol for generational rebellion in the 50’s by Brando, Dean and Clift, today poses as the banner for negative environmental facts. Maybe you’ve heard some of the statistics? It takes about a third of a pound of pesticides and fertilizers, and up to 10,000 liters of water to produce enough conventionally farmed cotton for a single t-shirt. An overwhelming 1.2-million brand new t-shirts are sold every day in the U.S. alone, the majority of which will end up in landfill in a matter of months.

And yet, it’s organic cotton t-shirt lines that most big-league retail brands such as the Gap, H&M, Levi Straus & Co. and Nike have chosen to get on board with and introduce the mainstream consumer to issues of fair trade, pollution, recycling and sourcing of raw materials.

Indeed, my portal into textile trade politics and the need for sustainable practices in the industry came after reading Petra Rivoli’s The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy: An Economist Examines the Markets, Power, and Politics of World Trade.

Just as I catch myself wandering around the shops, resisting the specious siren call to buy another t-shirt off the fast fashion racks, I consider it an auspicious sign when I look down at my phones latest message inviting me to Global Action Through Fashion‘s event, Reconstruct, Reincarnate, and Re-Cool your t-shirt + Drinks & Dancing.

Before you can say Proenza-Schouler, I’m at Temple SF, a green and sustainable nightclub sipping my eco-friendly Veev cocktail and purveying the scene: Amid sewing machines, cutting tables and silk screens, the hipster fashion crowd is enthusiastically ripping, braiding, printing and appliqueing their t-shirts into new looks. Stopping only to dance a little and flirt (a lot) they listen to speeches from designers from sustainable lines Vagadu and Platinum Dirt, who encourage and inspire the fervor with details of the reconstruction techniques they utilize in their designs.

Maybe it was the Veev, but in that moment I wondered if I’d been transported to a marvelous green utopia from the future. And it was a brief shining spot that won’t be forgotten by any of us that attended (apart from maybe the drunken guy making an utter nuisance of himself – ouch!).

If the rapid evolution of what a t-shirt can signify within our culture is anything to go by, fashion consumer’s increasing appetite for ethically produced garments that they have a creative and personal connection to will not fade with the recession or be limited to a certain demographic.

Only in San Francisco, you say? Perhaps, but the only way you’re going to see a fashion reconstruction party at your local nightclub is if you start your own, drunken guy and all. So do it. Join the movement, comrade. But bring your own t-shirt.

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