To investigate ways hands-on upcycling actions help reduce textile waste and enhance wellbeing

This Churchill Fellowship project is about how we can choose, wear and care for our clothes to reduce their ecological impact. Back in 2012, Jane Milburn began investigating ways to dress for health and wellbeing by choosing natural fibres (rather than synthetic/plastic fibres), developing individual style to be independent of fashion cycles, and using thrift/mend/upcycle strategies to extend the usefulness of clothes and conserve their embedded energy. Jane was awarded a Churchill Fellowship in 2019 but travel was delayed by pandemic restrictions. She plans to connect with slow fashion practitioners, academics and sustainability leaders in Japan, the US, the UK, Netherlands and Germany during 2022. This work intersects with the global eco-social awakening around planetary boundaries, climate action, war on waste, fashion revolution, buy nothing new, make something, craftivism and reducing plastic pollution.