What prevents people repairing clothes? : an investigation into community-based approaches to sustainable product service systems for clothing repair

This paper explores how we might reinvigorate community-based approaches to the repair of clothing and garments and examines the potential roles for online and offline activities to facilitate knowledge exchange, build communities and revisit repair processes and strategies.

Until the mid-twentieth century in Western society cloth was considered to be a valuable commodity, and clothes were regularly maintained and repaired to prolong garment use. Today the cultural and economic value attributed to clothing has on the whole dramatically changed and the practice of repairing or altering clothing has largely disappeared. While there is renewed interest in the creative potential of mending or altering garments in some quarters, in particular amongst the online and offline craft communities, within mainstream society damaged clothing is typically discarded to landfill rather than repaired. Based on empirical studies conducted by an interdisciplinary team of researchers at Sheffield Hallam University, this paper discusses the preliminary project findings and suggests what needs to be done to encourage and support people to engage in clothing repair.