In this episode we’re getting conceptual! Episode #42 explores an idea that is fundamental to living as sustainably as possible: keeping resources at their highest possible level of use. This conversation is with awesome return-guest Shelly Sommer, who lays out the principles of a circular economy and why we should be aiming for this important goal, within our making practices and beyond. Shelly schools us on all this with her usual fun and joyful approach, whilst also sharing many practical, actionable tips for how we might enact responsible stewardship whilst sewing. In particular, she talks me through her method for making ‘new’ fabric from scraps, which is an approach I’m so inspired by and have been playing with ever since. 

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Listen to my interview on the sustainable knitting podcast A Smaller Life HERE. 

Find Shelly and her incredible quilts and garment creations on her Instagram feed @encodedstudio. 

Listen to Shelly’s first appearance of CYT in Episode #19: Quilting and Conscious Consuming with Shelly Sommer HERE. 

Learn more about a circular economy on the Ellen MacArthur Foundation website HERE.

Listen to Episode #24: Conscious Making in Real Life with Rebecca Evans-Merritt HERE. 

Listen to Episode #20: What Thread Should I Buy? HERE. 

Listen to Episode #15: Hand Stitching Clothes with Louisa Owen Sonstroem HERE. 

Check out Shelly’s scrap-busting mini quilts HERE (pictured below). 

Read about the dungarees I made my son from denim reclaimed from unworn garments HERE (pictured below).

The denim patchwork dungarees I then made with the leftovers can be found HERE. 

Find abstract quilting legend Sherri Lynn Wood HERE. 

Learn about the Gees Bend quiltmakers and their history HERE.