KENT—Rentrayage a sustainable fashion and home brand that recently opened a shop at Kent Barns.
Rentrayage was born out of the concept of reimagining and reanimating materials that already exist, creating beauty and value from what has been discarded.
The store has invited upstate New York-based artist Tal Placido to fill the space with her work. As Placido paints on found materials, in this case antique tablecloths, her work seemed a perfect fit.
Placido creates her abstract, large-scale paintings with a range of mediums, including oil pastels, acrylic paint and graphite.
She just discovered that her reuse of materials as her canvases carries on a historic tradition. Recent studies have shown such renowned artists as—Titian, El Greco, Caravaggio, Velazquez, Rembrandt and Chagall have painted on linen textiles and tablecloths.
The researcher who conducted the study of this phenomenon suspects it was because tablecloths were wide and long enough for a large size painting and that these table linens were a symbol of luxury and status.
Placido recently had a solo show in New York City at Art Gotham. Her work has also been shown at Volta New York and Court Tree Collective.
Long-time fashion designer Erin Beatty, who lives in Bantam, transplanted Rentrayage from New York City to Kent Barns and offers upcycled fashions made from vintage and deadstock Italian fabrics and homeware sourced from sustainable artisans worldwide.
Inspired by Louise Bourgeois, Rentrayage is a French word for “to mend” and to “make whole again.”
Rentrayage brings old clothes, vintage fabrics, and dead-stock back to life, going beyond stitching things back together to create a colorful assortment of apparel without any further environmental impact
Beatty notes that the textile industry is the third most polluting industry worldwide, behind fuel and agriculture. Ninety-two million tons of textile waste—4 percent of global waste—is generated by the fashion industry annually.
The fashion industry overproduces goods by 30 to 40 percent each season. Every second, one garbage truck full of clothing is burned or dumped in a landfill and yet clothing consumption is on track to rise 63 percent by 2030.
Beatty notes on her website that only 1 percent of clothes are recycled into new garments and that the fashion industry is responsible for 10 percent of all global carbon emissions.
“At Rentrayage we regenerate and renew fashion’s surplus, helping to solve the most important issue that the fashion industry faces today: waste. We believe that value, beauty and purpose can be found in existing materials,” she writes.
Rentrayage sources from vintage or deadstock materials as these are the most sustainable options. When new materials are required, its uses regenerative and sustainable options that are traceable to their origin.
It takes back items from its customers so that they can repurpose them again and donates unusable materials to Fabscrap, a Brooklyn-based textile reuse and recycling resource.
It also supports artists and artisans around the world who share Beatty’s commitment to sustainability.
All the partner brands sold on its website work exclusively with recycled, upcycled, or regenerative materials.
Rentrayage, located at 12 Old Barn Road, is open Thursdays through Sundays from 11a.m. to 5 p.m.
