Clothes Pooling: the new way to share

Borrowing from friends is back. Time to start lending

Something borrowed: putting on the vintage style with Goodwood presenter Amber Butchard. I borrowed this O Pioneers dress from my friend Clara

So far this year we have rented, altered, mended, swapped and… allowed ourselves just a very few purchases. But there’s one thing I haven’t done yet - borrowed.

It might be, I’m scarred. In the days before I was grown up (flat shares, student digs, teen nights) borrowing went on all the time. How else to supplement our meagre pocket money/student loan funded closets? Cut to later years, and I haven’t made a habit of borrowing. Why? Let me tell you about the Acne shirt. It was pale blue, and perfect. A boyfriend cut with feminine edges, I could layer it under knits, throw it over vests, pair it with jeans and tuck it into trousers. It was a ‘wardrobe workhorse’. Until the night Kate came over and asked to borrow it. It was returned nine months later, purple. The wrong washing cycle.

I got my revenge. I shrunk her Temperley polo knit, so we’re quits now. Clearly I should have let this go, but as you can tell I’m still smarting. Borrowing needs some guidelines.

Borrowing is back in fashion - editor Karen Dacre wrote about it this weekend in Sunday Times Style, describing how she and friends ‘pool their wardrobes’. This makes perfect sense in a world of Uber and AirBnB. By Rotation is an app that is trying to monetise it - you can list your wardrobe and rent pieces from your favourite influencers. But if you have handy (stylish) friends, you don’t even need to pay.

Rule of 5 is an undertaking to buy no more than 5 new items of clothes a year. It’s all the planet can afford according to climate think tank The Hot or Cool Institute. You can read more about the science here.

I was going to Goodwood Revival (a dress up vintage fair, enormous fun) and had a couple of speaking events, which meant I was ‘on display’. No fashion short cuts here - I had to dress and impress. My friend and neighbour Clara Francis (founder of the brand O Pioneers whose army of Knitting Grannies I’ve written about before), has an extraordinary wardrobe. Obsessed with Walt Whitman’s prairie lifestyle, her style is a vintage fan’s dream, so I asked if I could borrow something. In a flash she said yes. Years ago I had loaned her a dress when she had to accompany her husband to the BAFTAs, so I popped over and she unveiled her closet of delights.

Nothing if not consistent: Clara in her bedroom showing off her glorious O Pioneers wardrobe.

I was fashion starved. It was a treat. I suspect if I had done this last year, when I was not limiting the amount I was buying, I wouldn’t have derived anything like as much pleasure from delving free reign into such a great stash. It reminded me of my days as a magazine fashion editor when the mythical ‘fashion cupboard’ (where our stylists kept all the clothes for shoots) was basically open season for the magazine staff. Now you know why fashion editors are all so well dressed - unfettered access to samples sizes.

I chose a floor length yellow one in the end, and was showered with compliments all day. Did I wish I owned it? Actually, no. Clara’s dresses are amazing, but they are not my every day style. Borrowing (like renting) allows you to try something different without commitment. You can be something else, someone different, then give it back having lost nothing.

What I learned is that, in order to avoid Acne shirt situations, borrowing needs rules of engagement. Here are mine.

Borrowing: The Rules

1. Always ask permission

2. Return everything washed and cleaned

3. Any loss or damage - fix or replace

4. Pre-arrange a return date and don’t hang on to it too long

5. Return the favour

Further evidence borrowing is back came on Tuesday, at the launch of the Smart Works Capsule Collection. (Smart Works is a charity that uses donated clothing to dress women for job interviews - it is fashion as a force for good.)

There I met Jigsaw creative director Jo Sykes, who has designed the softest wool overcoat, from which 25% of all sales will be donated to the charity.

Jo Sykes with the Smart Works x Jigsaw wool overcoat

I was wearing Clara’s dress again, and explained it was borrowed, (a moment of pride, not shame these days). “Yes!’ she said. “I do the same. I have this enormous wardrobe that sits there and does nothing. My sister in law is a primary school teacher and dresses like a student, all t shirts and torn jeans. I told her, ‘Please, borrow what you like!” She came back saying how it completely changed the way she feels about herself. She said she felt so empowered, which of course is exactly what Smart Works does.”

So, in the spirit of empowerment, friendship and the planet, why don’t you try borrowing again? And lending too, of course.

Have you borrowed anything recently? How did it pan out?