Selvedge 116: Uncut

January /February 2024 At the recent Selvedge Wardrobe Revolution Weekend symposium, our conversation revolved around the concept of value. Scarcity and value were comfortable bedfellows in a pre-industrial society, but today, when we live in a world of abundance, what to do and how we assign value is a more challenging question. This quandary accounts in part for the resurgence of craft in the 21st century and perhaps why we struggle with the concept of intangible cultural heritage in the UK, as outlined by Daniel Carpenter in his article “Culture Wars: Crafts’ Colonial Legacy.” Craft skills can be used to tackle the endemic problem of landfills when they are employed to upcycle waste into valuable new products, as illustrated by Ashita Singhal of Piawand. We explored mending in all its various forms. Kate Sekules gives value to throw-away fossil-fibre-derived fast fashion with visible mending. In this issue, Brinda Gill examines the invisible mending techniques of the Rafoogars of Na