When Did We Stop Seeing Waste as a Material?

There is something very particular about being a textile artist or maker. We rarely look at a scrap of fabric and see only a scrap.

A small piece of cloth might become part of a collage. A failed sample might be cut up and stitched into something completely different. Threads that are too short for one job may be perfect for another. Even pieces that have gone slightly wrong can sometimes lead us somewhere far more interesting than the original plan.

Perhaps that is one of the things makers do best: we look again.

This idea feels especially relevant at the moment, as the textile and fashion industries continue to wrestle with waste. A recent example comes from Exiled, a fashion brand connected with waste-management company MYGroup, which is preparing an exhibition for London Fashion Week using returned clothing, surplus stock, textile production scraps and other discarded materials.

The principle behind it is simple but important: before something is thrown away, should we be asking whether it still has another use?

For those of us who work creatively with textiles, that question is hardly new.

The Useful Pile

Most makers have one.

It might be a basket, a drawer, a box under the table or, if we are being truthful, several boxes.

Inside are pieces that are too small to put back on the shelf but far too useful to throw away. A strip of interesting fabric. A piece of lace. An odd length of ribbon. A square of cloth that has been painted, printed or dyed. A sample from a workshop. A fragment of embroidery that did not quite work.

To anyone else it might look like a collection of leftovers.

To a maker, it is potential.

The important difference is not the material itself. It is how we look at it.

When Something Goes Wrong

There is also a tendency to think that creative work has to be successful first time.

Of course it doesn't.

Some of the most interesting pieces begin with something that has gone wrong.

A colour may not turn out as expected. Fabric might distort. A print may only partially transfer. Stitching may pull or pucker. A piece may simply fail to become what we had imagined.

The temptation is to see that as wasted material.

But sometimes cutting into it, layering over it, painting it, burning it, stitching through it or combining it with something completely different is exactly what gives it a new life.

Once we stop worrying about saving the original piece, we often become much braver.

And that can be where the interesting work starts.

Materials Carry History

New fabric is lovely to work with, but older and previously used materials bring something else.

They have history.

A faded piece of cloth, an old linen napkin, a fragment of clothing or a piece of fabric that has already been dyed or printed has a surface that cannot always be recreated from scratch.

Marks, creases and imperfections become part of the work.

That doesn't mean every scrap needs saving forever. There comes a point when most of us have to admit that some things really can go.

But it does mean there is value in pausing before automatically throwing something away.

Could it be cut into smaller pieces?

Could it be stitched into?

Could it become texture?

Could it be used as a base for another process?

Could it become part of a completely different object?

Creativity Often Begins With Limitation

We sometimes assume creativity needs endless choice.

In reality, limitations can make us far more inventive.

Give someone an entire fabric shop and they may struggle to decide where to begin.

Give them five scraps, three colours of thread and an hour, and suddenly decisions have to be made.

Those restrictions can lead to work we would never have produced if every possible option had been available.

Perhaps that is another reason discarded and leftover materials are so interesting to work with. They already come with boundaries.

The size is fixed. The colour is already there. The marks already exist.

The challenge becomes: what can I do with this?

Rather than: what should I make?

There is quite a difference between those two questions.

Not Everything Needs to Become a Product

It is also worth remembering that reuse does not always have to result in something practical.

A scrap does not need to become a purse, bag or cushion to justify keeping it.

It might become a sample.

It might be used to test a thread.

It might become part of a sketchbook.

It might be the starting point for a piece of textile art that exists simply because it was enjoyable to make.

We sometimes put too much pressure on materials to become something useful in the traditional sense.

Creative experimentation is useful too.

Looking Again

Perhaps this is where makers have something valuable to contribute to the wider conversation about textile waste.

We already understand that a material does not necessarily reach the end of its usefulness simply because its original purpose has finished.

We mend.

We cut things apart.

We stitch pieces together.

We cover damage.

We add layers.

We change our minds.

And occasionally we take something that looked completely hopeless and turn it into the most interesting piece on the table.