How to reuse old clothes in a garden – eco experts reveal 7 ways of recycling worn out fabric that aren't just making a scarecrow

Old clothes can be tricky to recycle. If the clothes are stained or have holes in them, you can't donate them to a thrift store or charity, and it feels wasteful to throw out otherwise useful cloth.

One of the smartest ways to reuse old clothes is to put them to work in the garden. They're perfect for building scarecrows, but there are also a lot of other handy uses for clothes in the garden. You can reuse old clothes as plant ties and even in compost.

I spoke to gardening and ecology experts about the best ways to reuse old clothes in a garden. They gave me some useful tips – and a warning – about the materials you can reuse in the garden.

1. Use fabric to protect plants from frost

One of the best ways to reuse old clothes in a garden is to use them to defend against frost. If you've ever used garden fleece, it's the same principle. In winter, you can cover the soil with old t-shirts to keep the soil warm and protect seeds against frost and hail.

However, as with all of these tips, you need to be careful about the materials you use. you can only use cotton, wool, or linen clothes in the garden because synthetic fibers like polyester and nylon could introduce microplastics to your yard.

Gardener Andrew Marshall explains that 'Using old clothing can be a good way to protect against frost and isn't much different to the fleecing/blankets sold by nurseries.' However, he warns against using old sportswear. 'My recommendation would be to avoid synthetic materials if you can,' says Andrew, 'As they may start to break down in the soil and leach out microplastics.'

You can also wrap plants in clothes, too. If your plants are growing well in late spring and early summer but there's a sudden cold snap, you can protect your plants from temperature drops overnight by wrapping them in old clothes like shirts. You can just drape the clothes over the plant supports and secure them by fastening the buttons.

Andrew Marshall

Andrew is a wildlife gardener specialising in environmentally and wildlife-friendly garden design. Andrew has developed his landscaping and design skills to incorporate a wide range of design influences whilst always incorporating a natural organic element with wildlife in mind.

2. Reuse clothes to help defend against weeds

You can also use old clothes to prevent weeds. If you're growing a tree sapling or a tomato plant, you can spread old fabric around the base of the tree to prevent weeds from growing in the soil around the young plant and stealing water and nutrients.

All you need to do is spread an old t-shirt, shirt, or jacket around the plant and then cover it with organic mulch. However, while this method works, there's another technique that also uses recycled materials.

Andrew Marshall explains that 'You can use old clothes to prevent weeds, and many people use old carpets and such as a mulch to prevent weeds growing through. I prefer to use cardboard and lay organic waste on top of this, as it will all break down naturally with no nasty synthetics left behind.'

3. Snip fabric to create plant ties

If you have ragged old clothes, you can cut them into strips and use the cloth as plant ties. The cloth is a good option for tying young plants to stakes and supports because it's soft. It can often be a much better option than plant twist ties like these form Amazon because it won't cut into the plant stalk as it grows.

However, you again need to be careful about materials here. You will often see tights recommended as plant ties because they're soft and stretchy, but most tights are almost always made from synthetic materials like elastane, spandex, and nylon.

Ecological expert Aidan Charron says 'Old tights are made of nylon and synthetic materials. These synthetic materials will load your soil with tiny plastic particulates, and if you are growing root vegetables they can get into the roots, which you will then eat.'

Aidan Charron

Aidan is the Associate Director of Global Earth Day and an expert in ecology. He has a Bachelor of Science in Biology, with a concentration in Tertiary and Freshwater studies with a minor in Geographic Information Systems, from the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, and specialises in reducing plastic waste

4. Create new gardening aprons and kneelers

One of the simplest ways of reusing old clothes is to use them as gardening clothes. You can just put them on to garden, sure, but you can also turn them into more useful clothing, too. You can turn old shirts into a gardening apron to prevent your underclothes from getting muddy.

Andrew Marshall says 'I use an old jacket as an apron when working in the garden, or when potting up in the greenhouse. It works very much like a kitchen apron would.'

You can turn old jeans into kneeling pads too. You just cut off the legs, fill the legs with stuffing (you can even use old shirts as the stuffing) then sew the leg holes closed. Jeans are especially good for this because the fabric is tougher than other materials.

5. Add natural fibres to compost - and be careful

The most surprising tip is that old clothes can be reused in compost, but it isn't as simple as throwing old t-shirts into your compost bin.

As with the other techniques, you need to be very careful about materials. This technique will only work with cotton, linen, hemp, silk, or wool clothes; any clothing with synthetic fibers won't break down. You also need to remove plastic buttons, zippers, and labels, as these can't biodegrade, and you need to be careful of certain dyes and screen prints.

On top of that, you need to shred the clothes. Compost needs a mix of green and brown materials to create nitrogen and oxygen for microbes to grow and feed. Clothing counts as brown material, but needs to be mixed in with green material like grass clippings to work. Dumping a load of t-shirts in the compost won't break them down - you need to cut them into tiny pieces in order for the process to work.

However, adding lots of tiny shreds of clothes - especially wool - can be an effective way of reusing old clothes. It isn't as effective as other compost materials, but it works.

6. Reuse rags for cleaning and storing tools

Old shirts are perfect for maintaining garden tools, too. Pruners, trowels, and spades all need regular oiling to work. You must apply machine oil to metal blades and moving parts to keep them from rusting, and you should apply linseed oil like this from Walmart or some other wood sealant to handles to keep them smooth and sealed from water damage.

An old rag is the easiest way to apply these oils to a tool - just pour the amount of oil you need into an old shirt and use the shirt to rub the oil into a tool.

7. Make a scarecrow

Finally, the classic: you can reuse old clothes as a scarecrow. There's no exact science to this. You need to make the body out of two old sticks or pieces of timber, nailed, glued, or tied into a t-shape. Before you stick it in the ground, thread some old pants onto the vertical stick through one leg and tie them at the waist. You can then fill the pant legs with old clothes or hay to give the pants some shape.

Then, tie a shirt to either end of the horizontal sticks and tie it to the upright stick at the bottom of the shirt, and fill the shirt with stuffing. You can make the head by balling up some old clothes and then covering them with a burlap sack or some other old clothes, then tie it to the top of the scarecrow.

Old clothes aren't the only thing you can reuse in a backyard. There are several ways to reuse old hoses. You can even use old hoses to help mark out spacings or make a drill to help you sow seeds.