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GFW Visits...Oxfam Wastesaver

Sustainability is at the top of the agenda for most young designers, and there are so many ways to incorporate conscious design thinking into a collection. GFW travelled up to Yorkshire to visit the Oxfam WasteSaver to learn about reducing, reusing and recycling clothing and textiles. In the UK alone, 11,000 bales of textiles end up in landfill every week, so developing ways to reduce this waste is a lucrative skill which 20 final year graduates learnt about on the trip.

Sustainability is at the top of the agenda for most young designers, and there are so many ways to incorporate conscious design thinking into a collection. GFW travelled up to Yorkshire to visit the Oxfam WasteSaver to learn about reducing, reusing and recycling clothing and textiles. In the UK alone, 11,000 bales of textiles end up in landfill every week, so developing ways to reduce this waste is a lucrative skill which 20 final year graduates learnt about on the trip.
Oxfam WasteSaver is the destination that donated clothing that doesn’t sell in the Oxfam stores they’re given to, ends up. Here, it’s sorted through and re-allocated to either the Oxfam online shop, festival shops like those you can find at Glastonbury, or a suitable Oxfam high street location. Pioneering this process in 1974, Oxfam WasteSaver now handles 12,000 tonnes of textiles every year, ensuring that nothing ends up in a landfill. The 20 graduates we took along for the ride were able to choose their own fabrics to take home and upcycle into their collections for GFW20. We can’t wait to see the final results!
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Skills