Moira & Obbie - Clothes with a Longer Life

doilie%20shirt.jpg Today we bring you some life cycle “extenders”: Moira & Obbie. In what looks like Indiana, one designer is extending the life of old clothes by making them into new ones. The work that Vanessa creates is from 95% reclaimed fibers which she deconstructs to “then rebuild into something new taking inspiration from the story or use the item may have previously had to inform what it will become.” She uses everything from men’s business shirts, sweaters, t-shirts and old kitchen curtains to make her handcrafted, one of a kind designs. Vanessa’s work is inspired by her grandparents, not coincidentally named, Moira and Obbie. The history tab on the site explains that they were the first people she knew who recycled:

As a kid in the '70's I remember being taught to crush soup cans and collect compost. In many aspects of my life they have been a great inspiration, a font of creativity and inventiveness. When I began collecting old clothes, cutting them up, dyeing, screen-printing and quilt-patchworking things back together, they were a wonderful source of inspiration offering me their old sweaters, and memories of my great-grandmothers party dresses.

Her designs are all one of a kind, as we mention above and she has a gamut of products from mittens to bags, “swackets”, upholstered chairs and my personal favourite, the cumberbun apron. The prices are varied with the one-of-a-kind work and range between $40 and $1200 U.S. These clothes are really capitalizing on the 97.4% net energy savings from reusing cotton clothing. Check out their website here. The "Doily Girl shirt" picture above is Copyright Moira & Obbie 2007.