Clothes that are discarded in Europe by individuals and organisations are sent to Sierra Leone on a large scale.

While many of these clothes, known locally as ‘junks’, do find a second life, many end up being discarded in the immediate area, landfill sites, burnt or find their way into waterways and coastlines causing pollution to the local environment. Second hand clothes also contribute to the influx of western garments, suppressing the production of domestically produced fabrics and clothes as a consequence.



Each bale is sold as a tightly compressed bundle which must be bought without knowing the full extent of what type of clothing it contains.

For this project I bought two bales of these ‘junks’ clothing from a shop in Freetown located close to the port where they arrive. 

The clothes were oganised, sorting them by colour and whether they could be unravelled or not.

Many of these clothes were not actually second hand but were in fact clothes that were discarded by fast-fashion brands because they had a defect or simply could not be sold - the bundles contained tens of exactly the same items of cream coloured garments, unworn still with tags. 

After washing and drying the clothes in batches, the clothes are unravelled by cutting away any sewn lines and pulling apart the yarn.

The thread that comes out of the garments is then wound back onto the wooden sticks. Each stick of yarn roughly represents one garment - a few larger garments were wrapped across two sticks.

Finally I travelled with the yarn skiens to the UK. Arriving back to the place where they were perhaps first discarded. I hope to exhibit them at some point to celebrate their qualities as sculptural objects as well as open the possibility for reflection and conversation around the themes the project touches on.

Thanks to Tamba Thomas, Sia Lebi and Kashor Dumbuya for their great contribution of skilled labor that made this project possible.