12 Ways to Upcycle T-Shirts

T-shirts may be inexpensive to buy, but the environmental cost can be great. Your t-shirt has an impact on the environmental from time the cotton is grown and harvested to when it is woven and manufactured, dyed with toxic chemicals, and shipped long distances.

It can take an incredible 2700 liters of water to produce the cotton for just one single t-shirt. With only one percent of the world’s water supplies being clean and accessible, this is highly significant. Cotton farming also takes up agricultural land that could be used to produce food for local communities and it uses an extremely high number of chemicals during production.

Human-made fibres such as polyester and nylon also come at a high cost because they are manufactured using petrochemicals, pollute wastewater and are non-biodegradable.

Here are twelve cool ways to recycle your worn t-shirts into something new!