I had a revelation recently, and it came as quite a shock to someone who thought herself a girl-about-town. It occurred as I dodged hordes of inebriated race-goers on my way into town on Saturday evening a couple of weekends ago.

Being (a) entirely sober and (b) shod in sneakers, I was able to stride past the women hobbling along in high heels, amusing myself with the thought that, in their floor-length, empire-line dresses (which most seemed to be wearing) they looked like extras from Pride And Prejudice out on the razz.

And that was when the penny dropped: those maxi dresses were obviously the latest, hottest style, albeit a style had not made so much as a blip on my fashion radar. What had happened to me?

The reason that I’m not up to speed is simple: I don’t go clothes shopping on the High Street these days. I get my clothes from local charity shops and girly ‘swishing’ (clothes swapping) sessions – or, on the rare occasions we’re feeling flush, the People Tree catalogue, which sells Fairtrade and organic clothes.

Or I wear jeans. Which is what I do most of the time, if I’m honest.

It wasn’t always thus: in my former, less eco-sussed life, I was a total shopaholic and a liability with a credit card. Then I started investigating issues such as the environmental and ethical implications of disposable fashion – the sweatshops, the pollution caused by the industry, the waste – and decided to step off the on-trend treadmill and to stop buying new clothes.

The downside of this conversion to Mrs Eco Shopper was that I gradually lost interest in wearing clothes that were fun and frivolous and had begun to live in functional fleeces.

That was, until my friend Cindy bought me and my daughter tickets for Choose2Reuse, a “fashion extravaganza” put on by the York and North Yorkshire Waste Partnership, which was held on May 28 at York Racecourse.

I had a brief moment of conflict – the invitation clashed with an opportunity to march through Saddleworth, playing the trombone while dressed as a pirate – but my green side won out. I even wore my one maxi dress for the occasion, resurrected from the back of the wardrobe where it had been languishing since some time last century.

The fashion show, which presented collections from local charity shops, as well as designs by York College students, and some independent young designers, was fabulous, not least because I was able to raid the rails afterwards and indulge my latent shopaholic tendencies in an entirely guilt-free bout of non-retail therapy.

I spent all the husband’s car-boot kitty, which I had been expressly told not to, and returned home with a bag full of clothes, all of which I was able to justify on the grounds that I had saved them from producing greenhouse gases in landfill. I also bought a handbag recycled from a pair of jeans – it still has the belt, another bonus – and a sack.

Yes, a sack. It was 50p. I bought it for the irony, but if you’re handy with a crochet hook you can apparently weave two shoulder bags out of it... or make it into a scarecrow.

Over the bank holiday weekend we held a scarecrow trail in the South Bank/Scarcroft area, which proved hugely popular with local residents, shopkeepers and families alike. The idea was that the scarecrows would promote the York Green Streets Challenge, so I decided to do one on a composting theme.

I called mine Priscilla, Queen Of The Compost, though with her heavily padded upper body (said sack, stuffed with newspaper), floral crown and skinny legs she ended up looking like a cross between a prop forward, a deranged May Queen and the Corpse Bride.

I sat her on a compost bin on the front lawn, tying her to a tree for security. The compost bin then blew away, leaving her dangling from the tree in a manner that was more corpse than bride.

Still, it all helped to raise awareness for Green Streets, and if you want to find out more about the project we’re marking World Environment Day tomorrow morning with an information stall on the corner of Bishopthorpe and Scarcroft Road.

There’s free cakes, free light bulbs, free tomato plants, free advice and the chance to win a wormery.

And if I can find Priscilla’s neck, I’ll resurrect her, too. There’s only one girl in sackcloth around here and it ain’t me.