FABCYCLE’s 2020 Wrap Up - 2020 Proudest Moments

The New Year 2021 is just around the corner, which means FABCYCLE has completed another journey around the sun.

Despite the ongoing chaos that is happening around the world, we are privileged to be in a situation to sustain our business and continue to connect with our fellow FAB-family!

From heartwarming events, and fabric/zipper emergencies, to big company milestones, we would like to end the year with a wrap up of our proudest moments in 2020.    

January: Australian Bush Fire

To say that 2020 was a remarkable year would be an understatement. We kicked off January with a running start: providing wildlife aid in response to the Australian Bushfires. 

Our small ReUSE Centre became the central Vancouver Hub where makers were able to drop off the joey pouches, bat wraps, blankets and nests they made for the animal rescue effort in Australia. 

In coordination with Canadian Animal Rescue Craft Guild, Green Chair Recycling Inc. Air Canada and hundreds of makers that sent or dropped off their makes at our ReUSE Centre, we were able to pack, organize, coordinate and ship 58 large boxes that weigh over 410kg (that’s 3 big skids!) of Canadian love all the way to Australia; connecting community members from around the country, and making positive use of the power of craft!

We are incredibly grateful to be part of such a supportive community with wonderful volunteers and neighbours, whose help and dedication enabled this project to come to fruition in such a short period of time.

Also a huge shout-out to our FAB Team member Kirin for making all of this happen on the field and to all the incredible volunteers that showed up to help us prepare it all for shipping.  

March: Face-mask making tutorial via FB LIVE EVENT 

A few weeks into the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, we decided to connect with our fellow community members from a distance, by organizing an online Live Facebook Workshop to teach people at home how to make their own fabric masks. 

In collaboration with our sister non-profit Frameworq Education Society and talented home sewist Lisa Bunnage, we hope this light hearted tutorial gave inspiration to our fellow makers to persevere, and to continue creating projects despite the unsettling “new normal” of quarantine. 

If you are still keen on making a mask, the recorded live event video is here. 

April: The FABCYCLE Documentary: Unwanted Roll

Right before COVID hit, we had a group of students coming for a field trip to our Textile Waste ReUSE Centre. The students came from a special collaborative program with SFU and Emily Carr called Business of Design (BoD) instructed by our friends Emily Smith and Stephanie Ostler.

After the field trip we were approached by Dino is a talented videographer with a passion for telling stories of impact and when he asked us to share our mission to save textiles from the landfill on camera, how could we say no?

In this short documentary, Dino was able to capture the essence of our ReUSE Centre, not only in image but also in spirit.

Watch the short documentary on the video above or go directly to Dino's Youtube Channel (don't forget to comment on his video on Youtube to give him kudos for his wonderful work!

June: Unboxing Events! 

Commencing in early June, the FAB Team slowly began our now biweekly Live Facebook Unboxing Events, to reveal the contents of donation boxes the Re-Use Centre receives all the time, filled with miscellaneous fabrics and notions.

Amidst the new social distancing protocols, we felt this was a fun and natural way to reconnect with our FAB-family from afar, and to demonstrate the chaotic beauty of our Re-Use Centre’s day-to-day product collection and sorting. Since the first of December 2020, we have been producing a Live Online Segment, “Unboxing with Erin” every other Tuesday which will continue into 2021! 

August & September Zipper Emergency & Vintage Sweater Knits! 

At the end of August FABCYCLE was notified of a textile emergency through insider channels, where a manufacturer have discarded thousands of usable materials in an alley that were at risk of ending up in the landfill!

The FAB Team was able to intercept over 5 pallets of zippers before they were discarded, and as a result we saved an estimated 100 000 perfectly usable zippers in all colours in lengths!

A month later, we were also able to be part of preserving some local Vancouver garment making history this fall!

We were donated a great deal of sweater knits materials in rolls, bundles, unassembled sweater ribs, and scraps in a plethora of colours!

All of these sweater supplies were crafted by a locally Vancouver made vintage circular knitting machine from 1912, and FABCYCLE is proud to now acquire a piece of local garment history!

Read more about it in the blog post here 

September: Growing FABCYCLE Team members 

Although this year has been incredibly challenging we were fortunate enough to keep our online shop open (periodically) and maintain a strong online presence and order fulfilment from our Re-Use Centre, and we also grew our FAB Team from two to six people in the latter half of 2020!

In July our Inventory and Studio Manager Erin Gravelle joined the team of Irina the founder and Kirin the Product Manager, immensely improving, categorizing, and organizing the space at our Re-Use Centre, by creating a beautifully coordinated chaos of fabrics and notions, from what was previously a hectic disarray of materials and supplies.

Following Erin came Mel, our Assistant Studio Manager, and Virginia, our Marketing Coordinator who have helped shape the internal systems which keep FABCYCLE running. Also a HUGE shout-out to the Co-op student Nao, and ALL of the volunteers who have been integral to the shaping and daily functionality of our Re-Use centre!  

December - Gratefulness

It’s been 365 Days, over 60 Themed Fabric Drops, three new team members, so much and we mean SO MUCH FABRIC!

Through the ups and the downs, the struggles and the successes, FABCYCLE would like to thank everyone who has and continues to support us.

We are all manifesting nothing but positivity for the new year and hope to finally see you guys in person again soon at our Re-Use Centre.

And as always, happy making and HAPPY NEW YEAR!