One-time Holloway inmate Tara Stout wows Soho with “rubbish to rags” clothing range.

Published: 17 June 2011
by JOSH LOEB

WHEN television reporter Tara Stout spent time in Holloway Prison two years ago for breaching a harassment order, she discovered a new skill – creating underwear from scraps she found around the jail. 

This week the Soho resident took to the streets of the area to display new items from her “rubbish to rags” clothing range.

Wearing a “Roman-inspired” get-up outside Bar Italia in Frith Street on Wednesday, Ms Stout, 40, said: “Fashion has done ‘poorgeoisie’, which was about taking new jeans and ripping them, but no one has adjusted to the situation of the economy and the cuts as I am doing with these clothes.”

Other garments, which were displayed on a table outside the café, had “subversive” messages stitched into the fabric.

Ms Stout, who has also entered politics, as founder of the New Bohemian Fat Cat Party, is pictured above with Bar Italia’s Dino.