I can’t tell you how excited and honored I was when House of Glam was kind enough to invite us to join their Eco Fashion in the Park event at Highbridge Park in Washington Heights. So you can imagine my dismay when I told friends about it and some of them expressed their concern that people in less gentrified areas of the city may not know about eco-fashion and that our booth might be a total failure. I admit that where I live in Queens in a mostly Asian community, any mention of sustainable fashion would be met with total confusion. There are a few thrift shops, but if you tried to look for a store like Kaight where ethically made, sustainable clothing is sold exclusively, you’d have more luck finding an icicle in Hades. Still, I had a feeling that my friends were wrong about Washington Heights. First of all, they were holding an eco-fashion event there so I figured there had to be some sustainable fashion following. Secondly, it really bothered me to think that some people consider green fashion to be something that is strictly for well-to-do (and predominantly Caucasian) hipsters and yuppies. That simply isn’t the case!
Well guess what? I feel pretty damn satisfied because it turns out my friends were absolutely wrong. Every single person who came to our booth and started talking to us already seemed to have an understanding of what Clossette was about – revamping old clothing instead of throwing it away. What’s more, when I compare people’s reactions at Eco-Fashion in the Park to the event we did last week at the Y, there is a vast difference. Not to knock the people that visited our booth at the Y (we love you!), which is located in a much more gentrified area around 14th St. Union Square, but it’s true that we got more than a fair share of blank stares when we explained what Clossette was about. So you can imagine how delighted Jeanne and I were at Eco Fashion in the Park when we started talking about refashioning clothes and guests of our booth replied back telling us how they already refashion their own garments! Can someone from Washington Heights please come to Flushing and teach people here about eco-fashion?
Sorry that this turned into a bit of an exploration into socioeconomics but I really thought it was interesting to see. Thank you again to miss Gina Constanza for having us at the event as well as the awesome people we met from Nail Taxi New York, Beauty Blender, and South Beach Furs (which you might think are furs, but they’re actually something else entirely!).
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