One summer a few years ago, I moved into a Cape Town shoebox with a closet designed for a cartoon character (you know, the ones who wear only one outfit the entirety of the show). At the time, I had too many clothes and sneakers (I was a fast-fashion addict) and only a tiny closet to house them. That closet was my sworn nemesis. It was also an important teacher. It made me ask myself something pretty important: 'Why do I have all of this stuff anyway?'.

Around the same time I was working in media. One lucky day, a story on sustainable fashion came across my desk. A budding journalist who knew a lot about fashion and a reasonable amount about the environment but not enough about the two in the same sentence, I took the piece on. In turn, it took me on an entire career and passion segue-way.

That story and the closet shaped the next four years of my life. One story about sustainable fashion led me down a rabbit hole that became hours of interviews, hundreds of stories and years of research and writing about environmental battles, victories and change-makers. As I carved out my space in the eco and culture media orbits, my habits changed. I missed out on fast fashion. Trends. Overconsumption. Doomscrolling. All the other things overstuffing the closet of my life. As it turns out, buying too many cheaply made clothes is one symptom of a much bigger ick—trying to fit in. AKA FOMO. AKA a never-ending void. 

Eventually, I decided to get my hands dirty and tackle some waste myself.

A lot of the circular economy means dealing with waste. Pre and post consumption fashion waste have limited options on paper. It's something like: leave it to the landfills. Or, do something different and make waste matter again. JOMO is my attempt at the second option. 

I began upcycling because it gives clothes past their expiration date another chance in all kinds of creative ways. It began with pieces for myself, then some friends and now all kinds of cool and interesting people.

As for my closet, these days, I have a regular-sized one. It has too much space. Where it is full, it's filled intentionally, sustainably, slowly and creatively.

Ultimately, I hope JOMO helps you do the same for your closet. Or your mind. In fact, if JOMO is the story that comes across your desk and changes the way that you think about your relationship to fashion and our floating rock, then that's good enough. 

                                                                              Yours in Missing Out, 

                                                                                            Ash