BARNSLEY College’s ‘Reloved Boutique’ vintage clothing shop has already saved almost 1,000 items from going to landfill.
The store, based at the Old Mill Lane campus, sells pre-loved clothing while offering work experience opportunities to students who have additional and complex needs in the college’s Learning for Living and Work (LfLW) department.
Students in LfLW have launched an online Vinted store alongside the physical shop, through which they buy and sell items.
All items sold this academic year will raise money for the chosen charities, Barnsley Hospice and Mencap.
Nicola Thomson-Dewey, head of the LfLW department, said: “Reloved Boutique has been a great success and has quickly become really useful both as an educational tool and as a viable business empowering our students with real-world skills while giving clothes a second life.”
Sasha Beswick, head of sustainability, added: “Reloved Boutique is a powerful platform for spreading positive messages around sustainability, and students are learning a lot about the growing movement towards choosing ‘slow fashion’ over fast fashion, the environmental impacts of textile waste, and even the business aspects of buying and selling items online.”
