Some of the creations of Shanghai-based fashion designer Zhang Na under the label Reclothing Bank where second-hand clothes were used. (Photo : www.linkfashion.cn)
There exists a boutique in Shanghai’s Jing'an District offering mod pieces of apparel using second-hand clothes.
Zhang Na, Gen X fashion designer, launched Reclothing Bank in 2010, her second label made out of hand-me-down clothes and old garments.
Zhang told China Flix that it all started when she was in Beijing and some charity organizations left behind piles of used clothes. She collected them, had them laundered and made new clothes out of them.
Tons of used clothes in the country are normally donated to underprivileged people and textile products thrown away are recycled, reported China Daily.
Irish-born London-based Gemma A. Williams, author of “Fashion China” and former curator of Irish Design 2015’s “In the Fold,” named Zhang in her article in British Airways High Life as one of the “eight Chinese fashion designers to watch in 2015.”
Zhang took up fashion design at Xi'an Academy of Fine Arts in Shaanxi Province and attended Mod'Art International Institute of Fashion Design and Management in Paris.
The Beijing native opened the doors of her first fashion store in April 2008 in Changle Road, with clothes carrying the brand Natoo. It closed down in 2010 when lease doubled up.
She renamed her label Fake Natoo in 2011 after learning that a company in Tianjin is registered under the same name, according to Women's Wear Daily.
Williams described Zhang’s present label as “clothing that gives a twist on traditional feminine design . . . focusing on sustainability.”
Zhang said that women who wear Fake Natoo are “strong and independent,” reported award-winning online publication Cool Hunting. She designs by combining “emotion with fashion.”
Got some old clothes untouched and snubbed? Either donate them to a charity or head to Zhang’s boutique.
Allow Zhang’s ingenuity to work on them to become something worthy of the runway.
