Buy Nothing New – fancy swapping party

Before you read this post, I feel I should warn you – there are a lot of bird pictures. Lovebird pictures, in fact. But I’m not talking about some sickening couple pawing each other in public. I am talking about this little lady.

Her name is Beaky and she belongs to Kyra, who was lovely enough to host a clothes swap for Buy Nothing New month on the weekend. Here’s Kyra with Beaky and Lisa.

And here she is telling us all about the pieces that she was offering to swap. This is a See by Chloe dress. Sparkly!

And here’s Cecylia giving us a show and tell about her pieces which she got from eBay.

The idea of a clothes swap is to bring something that you no longer wear, or won’t miss for a little while, and swap it with other people. You can do this on a large scale, such as they do at The Clothing Exchange, or in a more intimate setting among friends, like we did. The swapping part of the afternoon actually took a back seat to hanging out and making new friends, although Kyra and her partner Nish’s rabbit, Bijoux was a bit shy…

Beaky, on the other hand, was happy to mix with everyone and find out more about accessories.

She likes earrings…

…and necklaces too…

Here she is with Jane and Nish…

Not only did we get to swap some great stuff, we got to check out some cool brands thanks to Kyra’s connections. Each of us has taken a piece home from Ghost and Lola, a jewellery brand that reworks vintage components into limited edition new pieces. They’ll be appearing at the fashion show I’m working on for December too!




I loved how Kyra had displayed things on old birch tree trunks that she found. And isn’t this sweet?

Speaking of sweet… no hideous air fresheners for this classy crowd… the air was fragranced with this lovely Cire Trudon candle from Peony Melbourne.


And we had lovely flowers to look at thanks to Domain Flowers. There was an eco back story to all these brands but I particularly liked this one – Domain reuse the husks, pods, seeds and branches of plants in their work and they are also purchasing a mulcher so that the unused organic material can be delivered to the Collingwood Children’s Farm, an organic community garden, for reuse. Beautiful AND smart.


Rings made from compacted aluminium cans from the Miles Mason Trading Company…

…which is also where these Lightly wall mount butterflies and birds are from, made from old crockery.

What do you think? Are you inspired to hold your own fancy clothes swap? Guys can swap too… check out Cecylia’s husband Chian, sporting my clip on earrings as lapel decorations (great styling, Cecylia!)


And even pets can swap. This red cardigan used to belong to Bijoux, but Theodore (Cecylia and Chian’s chihuahua) looks great in it too. Especially with this beautiful bird accessory.