On Feb. 3 from 10 a.m to 2 p.m, at Shoreline College’s Ray Howard Library, the Climate Club will be hosting a clothing swap event. This event is for people to take or donate clothes for the purpose of facilitating more eco-friendly forms of clothes shopping than “fast fashion”. There is more than just the clothes to look forward to at the event, according to their flyer there will be a discount at the food truck(s) and prizes for people to win.
The club advisor for this group is Laurel Ecke, a Professor in the Psychology department. Professor Ecke had this to say on why her students started the club, “The way that my class was structured was that we talked a lot about climate anxiety, about how people don’t really have outlets [for the stress]…The first step is starting to talk about [climate anxiety] and then turning those conversations into action. [My students] started out wanting to promote a low-wage lifestyle, and then they decided that a clothing swap on campus would be a really great social event.”
Natalie Worley had this to say on the clothing swap, “The whole idea behind this event is to promote the idea of thrifting and that getting a new wardrobe doesn’t have to be a big splurge or something where you engage in fast fashion. You can do it in a sustainable way while still finding things that you like and will wear in the future.” She also said she got involved in the event because, “We are hoping that if it’s successful, we can host more of them in the future and maybe even expand beyond just clothing.”
Her classmate and fellow club member Fiona Sullivan said, “When I began learning about climate change, it can be depressing and hopeless, but the more that we talk about it and the more that we take even small actions like this clothing swap, the more hopeful we can be…Re-framing the climate disaster in a way that it makes it approachable to people and more of a community building exercises [helps peoples’ mindset]…we can really take a lot of that [negative] energy and put it into taking action and making a change instead of just sitting with those feelings.”
