The CUCCR invites students to create sustainable and creative costumes for Halloween at their pop-in event.
Concordia University’s Centre for Creative Reuse (CUCCR) organized its first costume crafting pop-in, which will take place throughout October for sustainability month.
This event takes place as the possible closure of CUCCR due to budget cuts looms.
The CUCCR is the first university reuse centre in Canada. Established in 2017, the centre collects materials from all over campus and diverts Concordia’s waste for students and the community to take for free.
It repurposes them to make creative costumes, props and artworks. Their goal is to promote good consumerism habits for students.
“We always want to give students a place to reuse materials for their projects,” said Anna Timm-Bottos, the reuse and sustainability specialist at the Office of Sustainability and CUCCR co-founder.
The idea for the Halloween pop-in came from the desire to prevent new purchases. Holidays can be wasteful, and Halloween unfortunately takes the crown of debris. The CUCCR opened multiple dates where students were invited to work on their Halloween costumes, a more sustainable approach to the tradition and a cheaper option for crafty people.
Timm-Bottos encourages students to think about the practicality of reused materials and hopes this event will inspire them to bring this sustainable attitude to other holidays. She invites people to rethink reusing gift wraps and making their cards for the Christmas season.
The organization also asks students to bring the props and pieces of their costumes back to create a collection of costume items and expose them in the facility. The CUCCR will be collecting those various pieces throughout November. The creative costumes might be reused for other student projects.
While the CUCCR is a great resource for creative students who desire ethically sourced artistic materials, the organization may be about to disappear. Concordia has not renewed the CUCCR because of the campus-wide budget cuts. Unless it manages to gather the necessary funding, the CUCCR will have to close down in 2025.
In the face of this closure, multiple passionate students decided to create a student coalition to hopefully save it.
The Students For CUCCR (SFCUCCR) started an independent campaign to prove the importance of the organization.
The SFCUCCR has started an appeal to prove how important this resource is for students, and they managed to get 1000 signatures in the three first days.
Their best chances of securing the amount of money necessary for the renewal of the CUCCR is through student unions and external sponsorships. They plan to create different fundraisers to raise the necessary funds for the organization’s survival.
“The CUCCR was created by students for students,” said Julie Kriter, an advocate of the organization and a chief figure in the SFCUCCR. “A hundred percent of the creative student body could benefit from it.”
They have until December to change Concordia’s mind about the necessity of the CUCCR.
In the meantime, another creative pop-in will be available on Halloween for students to make last-minute props and costume items. The Used Material Depot is located at 1200 Guy Street and will be open from 1:30 to 4 p.m. Interested students can use the materials and equipment provided and bring some of their own.
