Two Willamette students combine their passions for upcycling and fashion at the Vintage Craft Fair

An array of vintage baseball hats at Willamette University on March 20, 2025. Photo by Sofie Szigeti

On March 20 a Vintage Craft Fair took place on campus, bringing in students, crafters and resellers to Willamette. Featuring a collection of attractions including handcrafted bags, vintage artifacts, second-hand clothes, and even a raffle to win a vintage item, this craft fair ensured that any student could find something that interested them.

Sabella Pisicoli (’27) and Aiden Dopson (’25), the two organizers for the event, decided to host this fair to contribute to the campus community and to “celebrate the spring.” Numerous vendors spread out on the second floor of the University Center for the event, some having travelled into Salem for the event and others currently attending Willamette.

Pisicoli has a unique background in reselling, which made her perfect for the role of organizer for this event. Her parents were some of the first eBay resellers, giving her early insight into and experience with the practice, and as she got older, she progressively became more interested in fashion. Pisicoli also has experience being a “contract worker at different music festivals,” and she has “set up different flea and vendor markets” in addition to reselling her own clothing. Back at home in Southern California, she explained that she has “a lot of partnerships with estate sale companies [that] would let [her] know when there is an estate sale going on.”

To Pisicoli, the Craft Fair was a combination of both her passion for reselling and fashion. Pisicoli’s booth was clothing-based, with her clothes acquired from estate sales and various second-hand and thrift stores. 

On the other hand, Dopson has a passion for clothes and selling them, but “hasn’t done many pop-up shops or flea markets before.” This is his second time doing an event like this. He felt that it was “nice to have more people coming together and engaging, trading, selling, and upcycling clothes and to see people come out and work on projects together.” At the Vintage Craft Fair, Dopson also had a clothing booth where he sold clothes he no longer wore. He said that although he didn’t use these clothes anymore, he knew that “other people might like to wear them.” 

Dopson sees fashion as “very individual and a form of self-expression.” He noted feeling fortunate to have the opportunity to “give clothes to people who like doing the same thing and putting different clothes on and having a good time,” and was glad that this event was able to become a reality because “fashion can make [his] day, like when someone [has] a good outfit on.”

Some vendors, such as Oregon State University third-year student Evany Noriega, came to expand their small businesses. She sold crochet goodies such as bags, beanies and accessories. Noriega is “Corvallis-based right now,” but she travels to different cities to sell her goods and get her name out to the world. 

Ariana Elsberne, who specializes in hand-carved stamps with original designs, came to sell her hand-printed clothing and accessories. Two years ago, Elsberne formed an interest in clothing and was “trying to figure out how to put something on clothing and started with vinyl,” but upon realizing that vinyl fails to hold up in the wash, she transferred to screen printing. When Elsberne “remembered how much [she] loved carving stamps … [she] got back into that, learning how to transfer [the stamps] onto clothing.” 

Pisicoli has another sustainability-based event planned to take place on April 24 at Brown Field, where there will be vendors selling goods that use recycled materials. The theme of the event is reselling and upcycling, similar to the Vintage Craft Fair.