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Charley Copperthwaite

Finding Hope in the Face of the Climate Crisis: A Knowledge Exchange Workshop

“The repairing and renewing of our fragmented corrupted world can not only happen ‘out there’…through sustainability solutions, but also ‘in here’, in the quality of consciousness, our intentional attentiveness to the experience of life." 

– Giles Hutchins, 2024 


As part of Centre for Sustainable Fashion’s (CSF) LCF Fashion Undressed: Imagining Possibilities Festival earlier this year, CSF's Knowledge Exchange Officer Charley Copperthwaite developed and hosted the workshop Finding Hope in the Face of the Climate Crisis, with support from Monica Buchan-Ng (Head of Knowledge Exchange) and the wider team. 


Tree, Work by Claudia Lehmann, 2021, BA Fine Art Drawing, Camberwell College of Arts, UAL

The term ‘climate crisis’ is so widely used that it is no surprise that when the environment is brought into discussion, our minds are immediately filled with the persistent messages on the negative state of the planet. In this time of uncertainty in fashion, feelings of helplessness and anxiety are often encountered.   


Our work in Knowledge Exchange involves collaborating with industry professionals to apply fashion sustainability research and education practices to a business context. As a team, we’ve been thinking about how to enable meaningful change in business, and we’ve identified that in order to develop positive, practical solutions, we must also look to foster a shift in consciousness. In other words, we need to understand the ‘why’ before we explore the ‘how’. This work contributes to CSF’s wider investigation into how imagining new possibilities and shifting mindsets can contribute to a fashion system that nurtures planet and people.  


On a bright Wednesday morning, we put this theory into practice with a group of industry professionals. Together, we explored how simply reframing our perspective on nature can help us confront the climate crisis and accompanying feelings of anxiety by making more pro-environmental decisions at work. The overarching aim behind this workshop was to empower participants to feel they can flourish amid the challenges, rather than just cope with them.  


Image Credit: Centre for Sustainable Fashion. Nature areas surrounding East Bank.

The workshop began with a walk in the nature areas immediately surrounding the London College of Fashion (LCF) East Bank campus. This location offers a unique space for consideration, with pockets of wild nature mixed into the wider, urbanised backdrop of the man-made Stratford. Whilst walking, participants practiced mindfulness, taking time to connect with their surroundings by listening, observing and quietly contemplating. The associated personal health benefits of mindfully walking in nature are well known, but research has also shown correlations between time spent in nature and increased pro-environmental behaviours (DeVille et al., 2021). During this time, it was important for us to nurture a space for individuals to discover their own knowledge and understanding, using nature as their guide rather than following our lead or instruction.  


Following this, the group reconvened at the Lab E20 for an intimate, open discussion on climate, society and fashion. We spent time sharing thoughts and observations we encountered during the walk, allowing ourselves the opportunity to simply discuss feelings rather than formulate actions. Creating the environment to do this was crucial for the workshop, as we wanted to convey the significance of sitting and reflecting before jumping into solutions.  


What became apparent was that the embodied experience of being out in nature had resulted in a recognition of the deep connections between ourselves and the world around us; connections that may not reveal themselves so readily in the boardroom of an office. The experience incited a shift in perspective amongst participants to a more regenerative mindset. This mindset emerges from the acknowledgement that we are part of a wider, natural living system which our traditionally linear business model does not represent or correlate with.  


Through these reflections, the conversation was able to move towards how we might translate this regenerative thinking into tangible actions at work. The beneficial impact of time in nature on a personal level felt reinforced here, as participants formulated individual actions and commitments with ease. However, on a broader industry level, the challenge of creating a system which mimics and correlates with our more-than-human living systems still weighs heavily. Participants expressed the desire for more tools and resources to support in making the radical feel less daunting and more realistic.  


Image Credit: Centre for Sustainable Fashion. Workshop participants walking through nature areas surrounding East Bank..

The learnings from this workshop demonstrated the importance and value of understanding the ‘why’, but also that careful, close guidance is needed in developing the ‘how’, particularly if businesses are looking to make lasting impact. Business-as-usual with a few tweaks will not be enough to solve the growing challenges we face, so we must now look towards translating this regenerative way of thinking into meaningful solutions that shift away from the current system. 


As a starting point, we have discovered that through finding personal connection with nature, we can start to bring connection into the wider organisations we are part of, feeling reassured by the understanding that many of the answers we need are on our doorstep, in the living, regenerative systems of nature. As a team, we have identified several initial action points based on our own learnings from nature. One example is our commitment to holding more meetings outdoors, to encourage more open, nature-first thinking. We have also discussed how we might align our work with the seasons, moving through quieter periods during the winter to busy periods of high output and development during the spring.  


This leads fluidly into our subsequent key activity at the festival: Workshopping a New Fashion System. Developed by Knowledge Exchange Associate Constance Jeffreys, this workshop approaches the ‘how’ in creating change, by asking participants to conceptualise their ideal fashion system. We will be sharing more insights on the learnings from this workshop in the coming weeks, along with how our work at the festival is informing our ongoing enquiry into how to enable further ‘shifts’ in fashion.  


References:  


DeVille, N.V. et al. (2021) 'Time Spent in Nature is Associated with Increased Pro-Environmental Attitudes and Behaviours', International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(14), 7498. Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8305895/ (Accessed: 28th August 2024).   


Hutchins, G. (2024) Reconnecting to Earth. Finding Place and Purpose. Exploring Regeneration, The Nature of Business. Available at: https://thenatureofbusiness.org/2024/03/25/reconnecting-to-earth-finding-place-and-purpose-exploring-regeneration/#:~:text=It%20is%20through%20life%2C%20through,into%20the%20Era%20of%20Regeneration (Accessed: 28th August 2024).  

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