Your wardrobe's second life.

• Position: FASHION - Brief article

What happens to the sweaters, jeans, and sneakers you donate to charity? If you think most of them go to the needy, think again: 80 percent of donated clothes--roughly 3.8 billion pounds each year in the U.S. alone--end up with textile recyclers. Are charities pulling a fast one on you? Not really. Goodwill shops and charities have room for only so many clothes, so when things stack up too high, the surplus is sold to recyclers, with the charities using the proceeds to help their causes. About half the clothes sold to textile recyclers in the U.S. are turned...