It’s easy being green: Can I recycle my old clothing?

This is just the beginning of my "collection"

So I’ve mentioned before that I’ve been going through everything we have to find ways to have less stuff in our little condo (recycling, donating, selling). It’s been going well so far but one thing I’ve noticed and I’ll admit is that I’ve been a bit of a hoarder. Yep. Me. What have I been hoarding you ask? Clothes. Not clothes that I want to wear or whatever. Clothes that have holes and stains in them that I can’t give as a hand-me-down or to a charity. The thought of throwing them away didn’t seem right.  So I’ve been hoarding them, hoping that I could figure out a way to recycle or reuse the clothes.

Well, it turns out I can keep clothes in bags for only so long before I get antsy. So I started looking online for solutions.  Here’s what I came up with:

1)   The North Face has a program called CLOTHES THE LOOP where you can drop off used clothes and footwear to their stores (only participating locations).  Any brand and condition of clothing is accepted.  You can find out the participating locations here.

2)   H&M is doing a similar program.  They also take any brand and any condition of clothes (no shoes) but you can take it to any H&M store and you can receive a voucher with a discount for your next purchase.  The limit is two shopping bags of clothing a day. Find out more here.

3)   GROWNYC has a program as well. This program is for New York City residents.  If you’re a New Yorker, check out the drop-off days/times here.

4)   Chicago Textile Recycling allows you to set up a clothing drive to recycle your used clothing. Find out more here.

There are more options online. If none of these choices work for you, it just takes a quick search to find one that is closer to home. Luckily, it looks like more and more metropolitan areas and clothing stores are catching on.

Because I want to get these bags out as soon as possible and I don’t live close to the Chicago area North Face that’s listed as a participating location, I’m going to do the H&M program.   Maybe in the near future I can set up a clothing drive through Chicago Textile Recycling.

One bag down, one more to go

finally they are filled

Ready to go

What about you? Have you tried any of these programs out or a program near your home?

For more information on where you can recycle unused/broken items, check out earth911, they have a lot of resources there.