Woollykins, based at The Mill Castlemaine, has your family covered from top to toe with a wool-centric, hand-picked selection of sustainable and organic merino clothes, ethically produced and made to last. With items suitable for newborns up to 14 years, and grown-ups too, they have handpicked their favourite eco and ethical brands from around the world.
Woollykins has hunted down what they believe is the finest, low-impact, minimally processed, ethically sourced, organic clothing for you and your children. Their favourite brands Disana, Engel and Cosilana are established German brands that have been at the forefront of Natural organic textiles for the past 45+ years and all carry the IVN Best & GOTS labels, meaning that all aspects of the materials and manufacture of the garments meet the highest standard in organic and ethically made textiles that cannot be subject to cruel animal practices or any chemical treatments like Superwash or chemical moth deterrents.
In-house they create UMIFORM Lifewear: Linen & Hemp clothing especially designed for mothers, UMIFORM Botanicals: plant dyed socks and limited edition wool clothing, and UMIFORM Knitwear Vintage style alpaca knitwear ethically made in Peru.
In addition to ethically produced items, Woollykins has developed a Circular Clothing initiative – reNEWool, with a mission to keep Woollykins garments in circulation, raise awareness about the value of caring for and mending textiles, making quality Woollykins clothing accessible to more families and to raise money for local environmental and social causes.
This initiative enables Woollykins customers to return pre-loved Woollykins garments and, based on their condition, customers receive a percentage of what they paid for the item new as points which can be redeemed in store. These items are then reconditioned and made available for sale again at a more affordable price.
Still in its early stages, customers have really embraced the idea and Woollykins are coming across pieces they haven’t seen in the range for up to eight years! Because there is such a process involved with offering such a service, this may only be offered in the slower months of September to February, but Woollykins are so passionate about this they’re determined to make it work.
To find out more about the reNEWool initiative, click here.
Woollykins also offers a range of very popular mending kits. They source end cones of yarn from some suppliers with organic merino wool yarns that they wind (by hand!) to create mending yarn cards as part of the kits and process holey wool collected from Op Shop waste into felted patches. The bags that the kits come in are made from waste from Wonderpants (comfy underwear made on site at The Mill Castlemaine) production. The darning mushrooms in the kit are made locally by a wood turner who uses his wood off cuts, so each one is beautiful and made from timbers ranging from red gum to sycamore.
Discover more of the wonderful range of natural woollies online at Woollykins or pop in and visit their showroom at The Mill Castlemaine, Wednesday to Friday 11am-5pm and Saturday 11am-4pm.
