"A Love Letter to Savers" -small anecdote by Paramax

stop playing yourselves and go to savers

or something like that.

it’s too late to ignore the

$4.3 billion of unsold clothes

H&M literally keeps stocked high as a mountain,

or the smoke stacks

that billow from the back alleys of Burberry.

full seasons smoldering away, while suits perpetuate the aura

that your winter coat won’t fit next winter,

that the way to stay warm is to purchase new leather,

new fox fur, new cotton.

but all of that exists in the world already...

it’s like buying a bottle of water with a water fountain outside,

or buying a water bottle when your friend is offering you a sky

from their bottle.

‘fashion’ is 4% of the world’s annual waste,

(mostly on the side of production)

a lot of clothes we don’t need getting thrown out,

like that side of peas you thought you were still hungry for.

but then, there’s savers

ah savers

you know it’s home the moment you walk in.

it was the savers in West Roxbury that made me understand there’s more to buying clothes than the convenience fast-fashion sells, the ease at which we support a system of waste.

it made me realize there’s more than just one style of pants, reimposed on different models for the same purpose: to sell a brand. savers keeps it much, much realer than that.

it’s a connection you can make on so many different levels: it’s a whole warehouse of clothes with the sole purpose of reuse. brands that you dreamed about having in your closet, or that you never even heard of.

and, it’s a family you didn’t know had.

I remember when I went to savers for the first time back in 2015: the warm smell of washing machines and the crackle of static electricity flowing between fuzzy sweater sleeves. there was a dim yellow LED light hung from the ceiling that showed all the clothes for what they were...no features being hidden or capped about. I probably bought a windbreaker and a crewneck for the oncoming fall, and they were so kind as to offer me a membership after my purchase. it’s a membership you are essentially required to care about, through the sheer power of love itself. once you get to 100 points, you get a discount on your next purchase, which then starts the cycle of point-earning all over again. but in some ways, it feels deeper than just the points of purchase.

there’s a depth that comes from wearing a pair of pants that have already lived a life before yours. it’s humbling. it’s easy to be hot shit in your new jnco jeans and subsequently exist in your own world. To wear those jnco’s from that back rack though, feels like putting yourself in the context of their history. it’s yet another take on the way those big ass denims have already been rocked.

so stop playing yourselves,

and go to savers.

change the world one t shirt at a time,

and 700 gallons of water that no longer has to be used

on that new OVO merch

that caught your eye

oh so long ago.