Sporting goods such as football boots and scarfs have always been a male-dominated product, but this year independent and sustainable fashion labels/designers are changing this gender-specific regime and opening it up to the female audience. As the demand for recycled clothes rises, the creativity of producing said clothing expands with the young generation being the number one audience.
The two independent labels HARAM and 1XBLUE have caught the attention of many fashion fanatics when it comes to re-working football goods. Both differing in style and approach the labels have created a uniquely conceptual ideology of fashion whilst making use of the never-ending amount of wasted football merchandise seen all over the world.
HARAM is a Berlin based clothing brand specialising in the craftmanship of football boot corsets. The designer has gained over 7k on Instagram and has had her work seen on big names such as The Clermont Twins, Slim Soledad and Giorgia Bottini. The statement piece corset is put together by sewing the top layers of fabric from a pair of football boots to one another, with what was the hole for your foot - being a secure bra-like feature of the corset. The corsets come in a range of colourways/brands, with the most popular being Nike.
Re-working fashion and making use of our "rubbish" is a way forward to being more environmentally friendly, shoes are a product of everyday use - everyone owns a pair of shoes and 20 million are being manufactured every year. Labels such as HARAM have granted us a creative way to re-work not only the shoe but the function of the shoe to fit another purpose, and another audience.
Images taken from the official @haramwithsugar Instagram
Label 1XBLUE created by independent designer Lois Saunders re-works football scarves into matching two-pieces for the female figure. 1XBLUE presents incredible stitching and tailoring which has been featured on pages Season Zine, Thrifted.com and Puer. Lois has also had her designs modelled by several well-known models/talents such as Juno Birch, Buck Betty, Remi Lewis, Jaz Ruby and Chi Virgo. Launching her label earlier this year in Feb Lois says "The focus for 1Xblue being on recycling old football memorabilia gives the brand a nostalgic aesthetic which in turn creates garments that are stylish with a sporty theme and history. But, although the focus is on sustainability, we are working on creating our own line to make the designs more personal to the brand.” Her most popular designs are currently the devil set, the Hello Kitty set and the Nike swoosh set.
Images taken from the official @lois1xblue Instagram
More than 300,000 tonnes of used clothing go to landfill in the UK every year (estimated £140 million worth), according to the waste charity Warp. More labels and designers are pulling up their socks with sustainability so, we as a nation can better ourselves and our environment.
Written By Izabel Rose (Jr Editor)