Author: Julia Patrick

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Coming up: Sustainable Fashion schools photo shoot among the dinosaurs

This autumn we are delighted to be working with Kim Polgreen, LCON member and sustainable fashion enthusiast, and teachers and students from three north Oxford schools, on a project to highlight the thrills available from creating your own fashion by shopping second hand: a second hand fashion photo shoot to raise awareness of sustainable fashion.
 
Kim is an Oxford-based freelance sustainability educator, running events for young people to enthuse them about a sustainable future. She is Youth Educator in Residence at Wytham Woods, Oxford University’s research woodland, and runs an annual summer school for teenagers at the University’s Environmental Change Institute.

The schools involved are The Cherwell School, Oxford High School and St Clare’s College and we are really grateful to the teachers who are so generously giving their time and enthusiasm to make this project happen. We are also so grateful to Janet at the Oxfam shop in Summertown who is letting us have access to piles of donated clothes, and to staff at Oxfam head office who are supporting us with resources and encouragement. And we are thrilled that the Oxford University’s Museum of Natural History has agreed to let us do our fashion shoot amongst their dinosaurs – highlighting extinction!

The shoot takes place on 6 November, the Global Day of Action for Climate Justice, also coinciding with COP26. Once the photos are taken the students will reconvene to create posters on sustainable fashion using their photos, and feed back what they have learned to their schools. LCON will help publicise the posters and messages more widely.

We hope the project will be exciting and fun, and engage a wide range of people in a growing movement to bend the trend from fast to sustainable fashion.

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The results are in! Find out how residents responded to our bus survey

The survey

During August and early September, LCON undertook a survey of local residents to assess the adequacy of local bus services in our area.  The aim was to provide information that we could share with Oxfordshire County Council, who are making an application (a Bus Service Improvement Plan) at the end of October for government funding for additional bus services. We also wanted to find out more generally whether or not current bus services are meeting the needs of residents, and how they affect the use of cars.

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Take action for sustainable fashion

Fast Fashion is harming the planet

The fashion industry accounts for:

  • 20% of industrial water pollution
  • up to 35% of ocean micro plastics
  • 4% of global fresh water use
  • 4-8% of global carbon emissions

Three out of five items of clothing end up in incinerators or landfills within a year of being produced. Every second, the equivalent of one garbage truck of textiles is landfilled or burned.

We can all buy less, repair more and buy second-hand. And we can call for change across the fashion industry.

Write to your favourite Oxford shops to demand better

As part of Great Big Green Week, Low Carbon Oxford North have compiled a directory of Oxford shops that score poorly on sustainability and ethical ratings (based on rating website Good On You), together with contact details and a template email and social media message.

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Sustainable Fashion #4 – Shopping sustainably

You may have patched up your old jeans, found some amazing vintage clothes, and donated unwanted items to charity. What if you need some new clothes and fancy a real-life (or online) shopping trip? Is it possible to shop sustainably for new clothes in Oxford?

The short answer is – it’s difficult, and there is no substitute for buying less. However, by being informed and considering our choices carefully, we can definitely mitigate the impact of our clothes shopping. In particular, we should aim to:

  • buy from responsible brands;
  • buy items that are recyclable or returnable;
  • buy lower impact fabrics.
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Improving your home to use less energy – recording, slides and summary of event

Jointly hosted by Low Carbon Oxford North and Low Carbon West Oxford on 19 May, our final ‘Spring Workshop’ from Communities for Zero Carbon Oxford looked at ‘Improving your home to use less energy’.

We were delighted to be joined by a wonderful group of expert contributors as well as ‘real people’ who had carried out extensive retrofits to their homes:

  • Brenda Boardman (Oxford University’s ECI, LCON trustee, and Woman’s Hour ‘2020 Power List for Our Planet’ Innovator)
  • Saskya Huggins (Low Carbon Hub)
  • Gary Irvine, former Home Energy Assessor
  • home owners Damian Ryan and Will Schreiber

You can access a recording of the event and slides on Low Carbon West Oxford’s website, along with links to the slides and videos of the other events in the series.

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Talking food and climate – recording, tips and resources from our recent workshop

Last week we explored the impact of our food choices in our ‘Talking food and climate’ event, our third ‘Spring Workshop’ from Communities for Zero Carbon Oxford (hosted by Low Carbon West Oxford). We were joined by another great team of experts, Anaïs Bozetine, Replenish Project Coordinator; Susan Hutchinson, LCWO; Ruth Lyster, School Cook at West Oxford Community Primary; and Nina Osswald, Good Food Oxford.

A recording and slides from the event are available on the Low Carbon West Oxford website.

Below is a summary of some of the information and advice from the event.

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Talking waste and climate – tips and resources from our recent workshop

Our second ‘Spring Workshop’ from Communities for Zero Carbon Oxford (hosted by Low Carbon West Oxford) took place this week, ‘Talking climate and waste’. It was great to explore different aspects of consumption and waste with a fantastic team of experts, including Anaïs Bozetine from Replenish, Jenny Figueiredo, formerly at WRAP, and Mark Watson, Waste Strategy Projects Officer at Oxfordshire County Council.

A recording of the event and slides are available on the Low Carbon West Oxford website.

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Sustainable fashion – time for more action!

Many of you will remember our Sustainable Fashion webinar last summer, with Kim Polgreen (Sustainability Educator) and Stephen Cawley (former Head of Sustainability at John Lewis). 

We’re launching an information campaign on Sustainable Fashion

There was so much interest in both the live event and subsequent video that we’ve decided to launch an information campaign: we want to continue our discussion of the environmental impacts of the clothing sector – and what we can do about it.

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LCON is looking for new trustees

Are you worried about the climate crisis and looking for ways to contribute locally and make a difference? 

We’re looking for new trustees, including one person to act as treasurer. Being a trustee is an opportunity to get involved in LCON’s projects in whatever ways suit your interests and other commitments (find out about LCON’s activities here).

LCON is keen for people of all ages and backgrounds to get involved: you don’t need masses of experience or knowledge about climate change. Trustees meet once a month (currently online).  We have an experienced bookkeeper to deal with our modest financial transactions, and a brilliant co-ordinator who provides project management and keeps everything moving. 

If you think you might be interested or would like to find out more, please contact our chair Rebecca by email to arrange an informal chat  (chair@lcon.org.uk). 

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Spring workshops from Communities for Zero Carbon Oxford

We’re excited to announce a series of online workshops, in collaboration with other community and environmental groups across Oxford – “Communities for Zero Carbon Oxford”. The workshops are all designed to help us as individuals and communities take action to combat the climate crisis. Topics include tree care, waste, food and home energy/ retrofit, details below:

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