Ask Trash Queen: How can we give old underwear a second life?

Thursday, 27 October 2022

Underwear, swimwear and activewear tend to made from nylon-based textiles which may not have secondhand value.

Dear Trash Queen, what do I do with underwear? There is no saving a bra when the underwire comes out, and I don’t really want to use old knickers as cleaning cloths. – Nicky, Auckland.

A: Bras tend to be mainly made of nylon and elastane blends, or sometimes polyester and elastane blends. Either way, they are petrochemical/plastic-based fibres, so like other plastics, if we could avoid putting these in our rubbish bins that would be fantastic.

Clothing and textiles like underwear eventually stretch and wear out, so they don’t have the same secondhand options as other clothing types.

Once you start looking around you, nylon/elastane-based fabrics such as Spandex and Lycra are everywhere.

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Alex Kirkham AKA Trash Queen is a waste specialist, here to answer your rubbish-related questions each week.

Swimwear and activewear are also made of these fibres, so when you look at it from that perspective, that’s a lot of clothing that may not have a secondhand value. New Zealand could really benefit from a recovery pathway for all of this stretchy clothing.

There are advocates from the textile industry in New Zealand who are strongly advocating for some sort of co-ordinated, funded textile recovery programme, and these nylon-based fibres would be top of my list for R&D investment in recycling and recovery options as they are as problematic as any other plastic waste.

I have seen bras and underwear for sale now that are actually made from recycled nylon and polyester, so it’s definitely something that is happening overseas. Unfortunately I don’t have a home-grown solution for you today so for now, the only place for them is in the rubbish bin, but hopefully this will change in the future.

If you have a question about what to do with waste, send it to sundaymagazine@stuff.co.nz.