20 Jul East Village chosen to pioneer new fashion rental platform
New fashion-rental platform LOANHOOD is launching with an exclusive partnership with neighbourhood operator Get Living, offering residents of London’s East Village exclusive first access to the app ahead of official launch in September.
Founded by Hackney residents Jen, Lucy and Jade and born out of a shared desire to do something to help reduce the impact of fast fashion, LOANHOOD is a peer-to-peer rental market targeting millennials and Gen Z.
Users can opt to be a ‘loaner’ the ones who take snaps of their pre-loved items and rents them out to those in their community, as well as a ‘borrower’, the one doing the renting and getting hold of the fashion items for a fraction of the retail price. Set up like a social network platform, LOANHOOD will give users the option to mail their outfits to recipients or meet in person to make the exchange.
East Village London will act as the testbed for the app with residents not only getting early access to the app, but also benefit from fee-free rentals for three months, first access to events and 1-2-1 support from LOANHOOD founders. The neighbourhood was selected to pioneer the app due to the close-knit community-feel which exists in E20, supported by Get Living’s sustainability agenda.
It marks another foray into the fashion world for Get Living who announced earlier this month a partnership with renowned fashion designer Christopher Raeburn to open a creative hub in the neighbourhood. The Lab E20 will offer experiential retail with a six-month programme of events, exhibitions and workshops with a focus on positive fashion, climate action and the circular economy.
East Village residents will be given the chance to download the app, upload items, browse the library and meet up to borrow or exchange items from early August. Users can expect to pay around 20% of the clothes’ original price to rent and will be able to rent items for a week at a time. LOANHOOD also gives you the option to borrow or exchange one item of clothing or a whole outfit as part of its ‘loan the look’ option.
Commenting on the partnership Steven Osei, Head of Brand Experience and Partnerships at Get Living, said: “We’re really excited to be on board with the LOANHOOD team right from the get go. Peer-to-peer rental clothing has a great sense of community and offers consumers a more sustainable way to update their wardrobe, so to be able to offer this to our residents first is great. There’s already a real sense of community in E20 but it’s initiatives like this that really help build that and get people talking – in this case about their love of fashion!”
LOANHOOD Co-founder Jen Charon says: “East Village seemed the perfect place for us to trial the app given how close it is to where it all started for us. There’s already a real network of fashion-conscious young professionals there so it feels like the ideal place for us to start. We’re looking forward to be able to offer the residents the chances to pioneer the app and hear their feedback!”
“For us, it’s the app we wish we had when we were in our 20s! The idea came to us after we all spent time working in fashion and could see first-hand the impact fast fashion was having on the industry. For us, clothes rental seems like the next logical step to help combat the issue and it also provides people really exciting opportunity for people to test out different styles without fearing the financial commitment of a whole new wardrobe.”
The LOANHOOD app will be available to download via the Google Play and Apple App Store when it launches more widely.
