4 years later...
ok maybe 3.5 if we check the actual dates. I try to do these updates every 3 years. 2021 was the last, I had just joined Sanitation Foundation. WOW.
2021-2022 ReFashion Week 2022 under our helm was amazing. So many partners. So much support. And then, a change in administration shut it down. Textile recycling still was considered important and textile collection was rolled out in Staten Island under said administration, but ReFashion Week itself was seen as a waste of time and money for the current administration's agenda. Ok fine.
2022-2024 I was asked to stay on for social media and communications (my favorite things: promoting awareness of waste management!) — I LOVED THAT JOB SO MUCH AT SANITATION FOUNDATION — but while encouraging New Yorkers not to throw their clothes away, instead to donate them, I learned there was more to the problem. So I went to Columbia Journalism School (hold fast to dreams) and pursued a thesis about what happens to the clothes we donate. Turns out, they still sort of end up garbaged. The story isn't all that great but it's got its upsides and it's very complicated.
I took a Fashion Policy course under Elizabeth Cline(!), interviewed The Or Foundation, visited behind-the-scenes of Green Tree Textile Recycling, Goodwill, Trans-American Textile Recyclers, STEPHEN BETHEL in Gujarat, and my thesis won a grant from the Pulitzer Center to go to Obroni Wawu in Africa and see the textiles piling up on the beach..... Travel. Observance. An Inconvenient Wardrobe mentorship with interns. National Thrift Shop Days with Housing Works. Ghana. Chats with Molly, founder of Osei Duro. Published about microplastics in Accra's waterways with Scripps Institute for Oceanography. Blog writing for Sanitation Foundation. New York Magazine likes my pitches but wonders, "Is there any good news?"
2024-2025 Broke. Back in the industry. I started writing for SKIMS & Good American and am amazed at the pushing of consumption—the big world spins on and on (isn't there a book with that title somewhere?), there doesn't seem to be much I can do about it. My grandmother passed away and left me her massive collection of secondhand clothes to remind me: preserving textiles is my passion, quality clothing is my passion, the history of fashion is my passion...clothes, not the industry, but maintenance and collecting of beautiful clothes. More on that later. We did more work on An Inconvenient Wardrobe with more Free Arts NYC students, always fascinating. Picked up more clothes to upcycle...still hate sewing... ha
This article got published in the NYT this week and my neighbors are considering getting a bin, and the discussion goes on. Read the comments of the article, it's so encouraging to see how so many people really do care about this topic. I took a pile of old fabrics for "Anne James New York" to H&M for recycling (???) because the Goodwill uptown closed.
I'm here to continue learning about how to handle clothing excess while upholding economic needs of the many people impacted by the production of clothing for homo sapiens. What will 2028 look like? Only AI can tell...
