These in-their-own-words pieces are told to Patricia Lane and co-edited with input from the interviewee for the purpose of brevity.
Marcelle Moreira dos Santos (Mars to her friends) is using artificial intelligence to clean up fashion waste. This 24-year-old from Vancouver and her friend, Khushi Khosla, started DreamStill to revolutionize sustainable fashion by developing an app to guide textile reuse and a robot-assisted textile waste sorting system.
Tell us about your project.
Vancouver sends more than 20,000 pounds of textile waste to the landfill every year. That is so wrong. We need different ways to dispose of the clothes we don't want anymore and change our approach to buying them in the first place. We have partnered with the University of British Columbia’s Capstone program and now, five computer engineering students are developing an app for us that will make it easy to decide what to do with used clothes. It will provide information about responsible thrift stores in your neighbourhood and let you know the original purchase price.
To raise awareness, we are hosting an event on the afternoon of October 5, 2024. Participants at Ecorise Festival can play a card game to learn about climate change, help Solastalgia upcycle by painting mural on repurposed canvas, talk about traditional sustainable knowledge from the Global South with Ritmos Climaticos, or make music at an open mic hosted by Rhythm Ensemble. An artist will build an installation using repurposed yarn. A workshop will teach how to mend or adjust clothing and other activities, too.
A short distance away at the Holy Trinity Anglican Church visitors can fill a bag with seriously cool, gently-used clothes for just $10.
Dreamstill has hosted other events like this, including other pop-up shops and some very successful clothing swaps. They are fun and useful, but the app will allow us to also work at a larger scale.
How did you get into this work?
I was working for Share Reuse Repair Initiative (SRRI) and came home one day to a house filled with bags of discarded clothing. My roommate Khushi had been out helping her sister find her cat when they came across dozens of bags of clothes left in an alley. We assume an irresponsible thrift store had left them there. She simply could not leave 1,000 pounds of perfectly good clothes headed for the landfill, so brought them home. We spent 40 hours sorting and laundering them and then began to try to find new owners. We spent quite a lot at the laundry and made some of that back with pop-up sales. And we contributed to some clothing swaps. We thought of donating to thrift stores but had to do a lot of research to avoid just repeating the problem. Also, thrift stores take only a few items at a time. My work at SRRI helped me to understand that textile waste is a huge and systemic problem. There are beaches in the world where the sand is completely displaced or covered by discarded textiles. Our experience brought that into our living room.
I have a degree in ecology and economics and I want to help create circular economies. The app is a great way to start. I have a vision of eventually creating an industrial scale machine that will sort clothes the way bottles and cans are now sorted.
How did the way you were raised affect where you are now?
When I was eight years old, I was staying at my grandmother’s home in Brazil. One night I woke up suddenly and stepped out of bed into knee-high water. A combination of trash and soil erosion caused by careless tree-cutting blocked the river and it overflowed. We had to evacuate immediately. It was shocking. When my parents explained the cause, it made a big impression on me.
I had to wait until I could come to Canada to study and get active. I knew if I stayed in Brazil I would end up with a career greenwashing for Monsanto or another big company, or perhaps, be “disappeared.”
I have been happy to explore my interest in sustainable waste management in areas like accounting greenhouse gas emissions, testing biodegradable products and applications of the principles of the circular economy. I am here on a work permit, but I hope I can soon apply for permanent residency.
What keeps you awake at night?
I am afraid that we will run out of time. The magnitude of the challenges we face seems daunting.
What gives you hope?
People seem to really like the idea of using artificial intelligence to help manage waste, and they are willing to support it. Mine is just one idea. There are so many others working with passion and intelligence.
What do you see if we get this right?
I have learned from my ancestors and from Indigenous peoples that using resources holistically, we can build a world that avoids waste.
What advice would you give to other young people?
Don’t imagine you matter less because you are young. Take risks and innovate.
What about older people?
We need your wisdom and support. This work is intergenerational. We are all in this together.
Marcelle Moreira dos Santos lives in Vancouver, B.C.
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