New sneakers?

More brilliant buy-less tips from fellow post-consumer, Malin. This time, she shares tips for pimping your sneakers so they look new enough to last another spring season.

Spring outfits and cute sneakers are a perfect combination. But, I’m trying to minimise my consumption of new things and it can be a real challenge to get pre-loved sneakers that look new. This spring I didn’t think it would be a problem since I knew I already had a great pair in the closet. 

When the sun finally showed up, and those spring feels started, I started digging around in the back of the closet for my beautiful, shiny rosé sneakers. But, when I saw them, all my spring feelings gave way to the kind of feeling you get when you meet a bad Tinder date. They were not at all as shiny and pretty in real life as in the picture I had in my mind!!!

With broken shoe laces and a greyish sole, they were far from the crisp white ones that I had in mind for the fresh spring weather. However, unlike the bad Tinder date, there was a quick and easy way to fix the sneakers. 

The first step was to have a closer look at the sneakers and find out exactly what´s wrong with them. Step two: fix it!

One thing that can make a huge difference is to change the shoe laces. I changed from worn out grey laces to new shiny rosé ribbons. It was a great improvement. However, with shiny shoe laces the sole now looked even more grey and worn.

I tried various different products to clean the white soles but with no luck. Then I came up with the idea of using a magic sponge. Within a few minutes of scrubbing the sole began to look SO much better! 

I feel a bit like I’m on the shopping channel right now but there are multiple different brands of the sponge and you can find it many different shops for a pretty reasonable price!

So with new laces and a few minutes cleaning with the magic sponge I´m now ready to step into spring mode in my brand new-looking sneakers.

Buying just one new pair of sneakers might not feel like it's a terrible thing to do. It's just one pair of shoes right? A drop in the bucket. But imagine instead that you take Malin's advice and freshen up last year's sneakers instead of buying. Imagine a million people do likewise and make better choices about what to wear and what to buy. Pretty soon the bucket will be filling up. Thank you Malin, for the inspiration xoxo