‘The community wanted this’: New Whyte Ave store sells only upcycled clothes

Canadians are trashing millions of pieces of clothing each year, but some designers at the Welded Hanger in Edmonton are turning some of those pieces into art.

One of Whyte Avenue’s newest businesses is a clothing store that only sells locally made upcycled fashions.

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Welded Hanger started out as an online consignment store, but shortly after opening the brick-and-mortar space at 10336-82 Ave. in March, owner Chantal Duval realized she had overlooked its true potential.

“I just started to get more and more customers coming in, requesting items from a small upcycled rack that I had,” she told CTV News Edmonton in a recent interview.

“The community wanted this store to be this and I went with it – and now here we are: 100 per cent upcycled.”

Welded Hanger sells items made by four local designers – cL Creations, Pondhopper Remixed, AWRY Studio and De Kill Designs – plus a new designer each month.

Their creations are often made from pieces of discarded or thrifted garments which were damaged.

“I look for the saddest objects, the ones that have a stain or a rip and just need a new life,” said Lorraine Dezman, the woman behind Pondhopper Remixed.

She started upcycling to do just that: give a second life to her young son’s favourite graphic T-shirt.

“He’d worn it to death, but he loved the graphic on it, so he said, ‘Mom, can you buy a new T-shirt and put this on there?’ I really had never sewed before, but I tried it, and it turned out. And he loved it and wore it for years afterwards,” Dezman recalled. “It started something in my head: You could do a lot of neat things with this.… And it also made me realize how much clothing is discarded all the time and where it ends up. And that’s very sad.”

According to a University of Waterloo study of the fraction of textile waste in Canada that could be reused or recycled, Canadians trash about 500 million kilograms of fabric items – clothing, but also accessories, soft toys, home textiles and more – each year. The researchers concluded more than half could be reused and nearly a quarter could be recycled.

“I want people to really shift that narrative. Just because you want something that’s new and that exciting feeling, you can get that in a sustainable way,” said De Kill Designs founder Emily Whistance-Smith.

She believes personal style is play as much as it is self expression.

“Funnily enough, in high school I had a mullet and I was wearing, like, granny sweaters,” the designer recalled. “(It) has taken me a lot to adjust to the fact that that’s the most popular style now and I was, like, relentlessly bullied for that.... It just kind of shows you that there’s never a right or wrong time to just be yourself.”

In fact, each upcycled piece being a totally rare, one-of-a-kind item is part of the draw.

“It’s like wearable art,” Duval said.

“There’s a lot of generic styles out there right now and this gives individuals who want to express themselves a little more by wearing a unique piece … the opportunity to do so. When I say that people light up when they find their piece, I think it’s because they’re inspired by it. It gives them a sense of pride when they put it on.”

Which, in turn, makes her proud.

Throughout 20 years in supply chain management in Alberta’s energy industry and then the beauty industry, Duval says she never felt like she fit in.

Her store seeks to serve people of all genders, economic statuses and styles.

“I want this space to be a safe space where people can come and be themselves.”

The upcyclers hope to inspire others to try it on their own.

“I want people to see my stuff and say, ‘Maybe I could do that,’ because that’s putting the power back in the consumers’ hands,” Whistance-Smith said.

Dezman added, “What’s the worst that can happen? The piece is already perhaps damaged. You can’t go wrong.”

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Nahreman Issa