11 Sustainable Fashion Influencers to Inspire Your Projects

These Instagram creators replace closet clearouts, fast fashion cycles, and landfill with sustainable wardrobes

That bag of old clothes at the bottom of your wardrobe has a few potential fates, the most harmful of which being landfill. You might also consider donating it to charity, so somebody else can use it. Or, you might find a recycling facility.

But what if you didn’t have to get rid of it at all? What if you could mend or upcycle these pieces so they can remain a part of your wardrobe for years and years to come?

Elisalex de Castro Peake is the founder of By Hand London (@byhandlondon), creating sewing patterns "for people who love to dress up, stand out and become the creators of their own style." In her course on making your own shirred dress using custom measurements, she stresses the importance of making your own clothes, buying second-hand, and shopping responsibly.

The goal is to select or make garments that will stay in your wardrobe for as long as possible—maybe for life! Understanding where your clothes come from, how they were made, and whether they are environmentally friendly, is hugely empowering and can help you build a lifelong wardrobe of pieces you truly love.

If you’re completely new to this, you might be thinking: can I create a sense of style when I restrict the ways I shop? And can I really keep a pair of socks for years and years? You may be surprised to learn the answer to both of these questions is a huge yes.

Want to learn more? Elisalex recommends following these fashion influencers and makers. Each of them shares top tips for stitching, darning, remaking, and recycling. Your wardrobe is about to get a whole lot happier and healthier for the planet…

Kate Ng

Sewing and sustainability advocate Kate shares effortlessly cool and classic styles for women and children. Her feed is filled with sleek shirts, collared dresses, and puff sleeves of all shapes. Fashionable yet also understated, there are so many looks to be inspired by. Kate also tags the patterns she uses, and shares ways to make the pieces yourself.

Orsola de Castro

Orsola de Castro is well-known in the fashion community as the co-founder and Global Creative Director of Fashion Revolution (@fash_rev on Instagram). She’s an avid campaigner for understanding how and where clothing is made, and is also the author of Loved Clothes Last.

The Fashion Revolution project asks an essential question: #whomademyclothes? Her feed is packed with advice and reminders on what to look out for when shopping, making, and mending our clothing, through useful graphics and interesting stats.

Beth Jones

Beth runs a YouTube channel, and proudly proclaims her mantra: "always play dress up". That means sparkly jumpsuits at the supermarket! If thrifting is your sustainability trick of choice, her feed is a colorful masterclass in how to style your jumble of often "mismatched" pieces in surprising and fun ways.

Dani Dawks

This master upcycler is proud to be "sew flipping extra"! If you want to see anything turned into anything else, Dani is the go-to. She has transformed sofas, curtains, tablecloths, and more into stunning outfits—from bralets to jumpsuits to jackets. Even IKEA bags have had their day in the sun on her joyful feed.

Portia Lawrie

Portia is an Essex-based maker who regularly contributes patterns to Simply Sewing magazine. She shares calming, muted imagery of tools and her process, while sharing thoughts on refashioning and making, through the lens of sustainability and the social impact of clothing. This is a great place to go for comfy, casual clothes and loungewear.

Wendy Ward

A PhD in craft, longevity, and broken-ness in fashion, Wendy Ward is also the author of five best-selling sewing books, including How to Sew Sustainably. On her feed she shares daily sewing life and the garments she makes, but also intricate mending projects, patchworking, and art pieces made from her scraps.

Celia Pym

Celia Pym is a London-based artist, and her feed has a distinctively creative feel, dense with textiles of all kinds. Having studied and appreciated damaged fabrics for many years, she has collaborated with museum archives and others to understand how clothes work on the body.

She runs workshops and shares inspiring mends that actually highlight the wear and tear of a garment. Because the life of a garment is part of its story, she advocates working slowly to celebrate that. Her intricately darned socks are a highlight!

Marlen Meiners

Marlen is a mender and artist with a love for vintage haberdasheries. Another amazing source of inspiration for darning socks and other wool items, Marlen shares practical imagery that demonstrates how to fix clothing in simple ways, with tutorials on how to use specific stitches for a more solid and hard-wearing mend.

Lily Fulop

Author of Wear, Repair, Repurpose, Lily is "on a mission to save clothes from the landfill." Her feed celebrates the colorful, visible mending projects of herself and her community. You’ll find tons of inspiration both for thrifting and breathing personalized life back into your existing wardrobe and home textiles.

Katrina Rodabaugh

Katrina is the author of Make Thrift Mend and Mending Matters, and advocates for sustainable fashion by mending, redesigning, and using environmentally-friendly plant dyes. Her feed features musings on life and sustainability, mixed with patching and mending projects. This is a particularly good place to go for mending jeans—there’s intricate and beautiful patchwork galore.

Marielle Elizabeth

‘Making slow fashion easier for plus size babes’, Marielle Elizabeth is a fashion influencer on a size-inclusivity sustainable fashion journey.

The plus size ethical fashion writer and photographer, speciaizes in content creation, product styling, managing and consulting social media accounts, and helping clients find a clear brand voice.

Marielle is an advocate for ethically made brands that dare to expand past size 14. Her website features a list of sustainable brands ‘that think your body is beautiful and worth adorning with gorgeous garments that are made of sustainable materials.

There are so many options for improving your wardrobe’s sustainability this year. From buying second-hand, to making new clothes, to refashioning your old ones, the possibilities for creativity are endless.

If you’d like to learn how to make dresses using your unique measurements, check out Elisalex’s course, Dressmaking: Draft and Sew a Shirred Dress. And for more inspiration, see our full list of sewing courses.

Credit for this post's cover on our social media channels goes to @timetosew, @bjonesstyle and @isitdanidawks on Instagram.

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