Sarah is our Vancouver-based education coordinator and facilitator. She had always loved making her own clothes, but didn’t know how to link fashion to her deep concern for workers’ rights and the planet. As she became more aware of Fair Trade in the 2000s, she completed a certificate in International Development from UBC in 2008 to get a sense of the practicalities, pitfalls, and power imbalances existing in the idea of “development”.
After finally settling into Vancouver, she spent two years with Eco Fashion Week coordinating the 81lbs Challenge and Upcycling Stylist Challenges with VCAD students, local stylists, and Value Village, and initiated a Fair Trade designer challenge for Canada’s 6th National Fair Trade Conference. During this time, Sarah went back to university to get a degree from SFU, choosing a major in International Studies/minor in Labour Studies to understand better global systems of debt, trade, migration, and gender disparity – all of which deeply shape fashion supply chains.
In her last semester, she worked with a small eco-bridal atelier Pure Magnolia, assisting with fabric choices and design processes related to waste reduction and sustainability. In her spare time, she interviews small eco-brands and leaders like Poeme, Fab Cycle, and Jessica Redditt on her blog www.thelove.ca .
